Guaranty Trust Bank has brought no less than 60 senior executives of 13 commercial banks before the federal high court, Lagos State as a pending suit between GTBank and Afex Commodity Exchange about a N17 billion loan under the Anchor Borrowers Programme loan lingers.
The 60 executives, which include the chairmen, CEOs, directors, and company secretaries of the 13 banks, are being held in contempt for allegedly neglecting to carry out a No-Debit-Order that was purportedly placed on the Afex Commodity Exchange’s bank accounts, according to The Punch.
The court presided over by Justice C J Aneke, signed an order in suit no. FHC/L/CS/911/2024 involving Guaranty Trust Bank Limited and AFEX Commodities Exchange Limited, mandating that the bank chairmen, MDs, directors, company secretaries, and liquidator of Heritage Bank (Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation) be committed to jail for disobeying the court’s May 27, 2024 ruling.
A legal notice titled ‘Order to serve notice of disobedience to order of court vide newspaper publication’ published in some national dailies on Thursday, partly read, “An order granting leave to the Plaintiff Applicant to serve Form 48 (Notice of Consequences of Disobedience to Order of Court) dated 11th June, 2024 and all other forms and processes that may be issued in this contempt proceedings inclusive of Form 49 on the 1st-60st parties cited for contempt.
The case was adjourned to next Thursday.
The following banks and their principal officers have been cited for contempt: Access Bank, Citibank, Jaiz Bank, Union Bank, Fidelity Bank, First Bank of Nigeria Plc, First City Monument Bank, NDIC (heritage bank liquidator), Polaris Bank, Stanbic IBTC Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Taj Bank, United Bank for Africa, and Zenith Bank.
Twenty banks were instructed to send funds to the respondent’s credit into AFEX’s GTB account until the N17.81 billion is paid back in the court order dated May 27, 2024.
The N15.77 billion outstanding and unpaid balance as of April 17, 2024, and the N2.04 billion cost of recovery and incidental charges make up the N17.81 billion loans.
The court also granted an injunction enabling GTB to seize control of these 16 warehouses located across seven states and sell the commodities stored in them, which it said were procured with the Central Bank of Nigeria Anchor Borrowers’ loan facility.
