The Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), on Sunday said it plans to commence payment of liquidation dividends to uninsured depositors, creditors and shareholders of additional 14 banks in-liquidation.
According to a statement by the Director, Communication and Public Affairs Department, Bashir Nuhu, the corporation said while stakeholders of eight closed banks will receive their first round of liquidation dividend payments, those of the other six will be paid additional sums due to them as part of their liquidation dividends.
The affected institutions are City Express Bank, All States Trust Bank, Allied Bank, Commerce Bank, North South Bank, Cooperative and Commerce Bank and Nigeria Merchant Bank.
Others are Hilltop Microfinance Bank, Olomoyoyo MFB, Evo MFB, Ngwegwe MFB, Bekwarra MFB, Argungu MFB and Edet MFB.
The statement urged eligible stakeholders of these banks to visit the corporation’s offices nationwide for verification of their claims, or in the alternative, do so on its website.
In a related development, the corporation has commenced verification of depositors of 22 MFBs whose operating licences were recently revoked by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The verification exercise is geared towards payment of insured sums to their eligible depositors.
Depositors of the affected MFBs were advised to visit the closed banks’ addresses where their claims would be verified by NDIC officials, or the corporation’s website for the list of the banks and to verify their claims.
Investdata News recalls Alhaji Ganiyu Ogunleye, former Managing Director and Chief Executive of NDIC as saying prompt resolution of the failed banks in the country to minimize the sufferings of innocent depositors was being hindered by litigations.
He lamented that the slow pace of settling customers of the affected banks resulted from court cases by erstwhile shareholders and directors of the affected banks.
Addressing journalists at a workshop organized corporation in November 2006, Ogunleye said insider abuse and gross mismanagement were substantial contributors to the failure of most of the bank, as shown by a diagnostic review.
According to him, “there were unwholesome practices which manifested in non-performing insider loans and assets stripping. For example, in one of the banks, over 60% of the loan portfolio was granted to the erstwhile chairman’s related companies while in another bank, an advance rent of N250m was paid over two years ago for office space in a property owned by the erstwhile chairman, that was still under construction as of then.
