WEMA BANK SCAM: MORE BANK CHIEFS TO GO

The deputy inspector-general of police (DIG) investigations, Keran Dudari, Tuesday in Abuja said that more bank executives would be arrested in connection with the Wema Bank plc scam.

Dudari told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that “many banks are involved in the scam and many of the personnel are managing directors of their respective banks. We will arrest, investigate and prosecute all those involved,” he said.

The police chief said that the Special Fraud Unit (SFU) of the Force Criminal Investigation Department had already arrested many suspects in the big racket. “I can confirm to you that many of them are being detained and many more bank officials will be arrested. I do not want to give more details because it will jeopardise our investigation,” he said.

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The managing director of the bank, Adebisi Omoyeni, was arrested on March 26, in connection with the scam Allegations against Omoyeni were that he asked for and got a N90 million housing allowance upfront for five years, amounting to N450 million.

Other allegations against him include exposing the bank to N8.9 billion in lending to WEMA Assets Management and N11.7 billion to Independent Securities Limited and for writing off non-performing insider related facilities without regulatory authority’s approval.

There was also the allegation that Omoyeni took undue advantage of a CBN directive to acquire shares of Wema Bank last year. The CBN had directed that cumulative government stake in any of the nation’s 25 banks by March 31, last year be no more than five per cent. As a result of this, the banks had made spirited efforts to comply before the deadline through a “special offer” of its shares to the public on the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE).

Taking advantage of this, Omoyeni was said to have set aside about N4 billion, with which he mopped up a substantial portion of the 40 per cent stake in the bank until recently owned by the governments of five South Western States of Ogun, Ondo, Oyo, Osun and Ekiti.