A lagos High court, Osborne lkoyi Division presided over by Justice Okusanya has ruled against first bank plc over its decision to sue Barr. Mike lgini for carrying out the instruction of his client by writing a letter of demand to first bank over a number of unresolved issues bordering on unethical banking operations.
“This suit discloses no reasonable cause of action against lgini as a solicitor’s letter of demand cannot be the basis for filing a suit. It was a letter written on a privileged occasion, lgini as a legal practitioner enjoys certain immunity in carrying out his client’s instruction”
Broron oil & Gas Company Ltd had approached Mike Igini Chambers to complain of how the Bank had cheated it through manipulations and unethical banking conducts, that it claimed had caused the company huge financial losses both in Naira and Dollars.
Igini acted according to his client brief
and wrote a letter to First Bank and Central Bank of Nigeria as Regulator as well as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), asking them to resolve the alleged huge millions in dollars and Naira as a result of FBN’s unethical banking, which had almost destroyed his client, Broron oil and Gas Company.
Curiously, Rather than act on the petitions from Mike Igini Chambers by addressing the issues as demanded by the law firm, First Bank instituted a personal legal action against Mike lgini calling on CBN as a regulator and the EFCC as an anti-graft agency that has legal responsibility under the Act to investigate financial crimes, from intervening in the matter.
Meanwhile, the CBN through its Consumer Protection Department had actually waded into the matter through a technical Committee it set up that sat for three days with representatives from First Bank, Broron Oil and Gas. The meeting presided over by CBN ended with a directive by the CBN to the FBN to refund all the millions of dollars and Naira withdrawn from Broron account under questionable and unexplainable circumstances. But the same CBN has failed woefully to give effect to its directive as a regulator.
From the certified true copy of the petition by Mike lgini Chambers, FBN concealed and failed to avail Broron Oil and Gas Company of its successful bid of $26.7 million forex from CBN for the purchase of operations vessel that it applied for through FBN to CBN as its banker.
The petition alleged that FBN instead lied that it lent Broron its own dollar for the purchase of the vessel but available documents from first bank and letter from CBN shows it was Broron oil & Gas Company applucation for $26.750 million dollars that was approved and used for the purchase of the vessel.
The petition noted but for the unethical banking conduct of FBN, Broron oil and Gas at the time of the approval by CBN needed to use about N4.3 billion at the exchange rate of N153 to a dollar to purchase the approved dollar from CBN through its bank, but FBN allegedly concealed the successful approval of information from BRORON Oil and Gas Company.
The petition further alleged that as inflow dollars was coming to Broron’s account from its oil services operations, FBN was wrongfully, if not criminally, collecting repayment of the $26.7 million from the company’s account to the tune of over $32 million plus interest.
In another instance of the bank’s alleged unethical practice, the petition noted that FBN withheld a loan of $9.2 million grant from Bank of Industry (BOI) to Broron (the beneficiary) and was trading with. It further alleged that not only was FBN trading with it, doing round-tripping it was equally fraudulently using the dollar money from Broron account in FBN to the tune of over $2 million dollars pay the interest for over two years.
“The Bank of industry had to demand for the return of the money upon realization that FBN kept the money to itself,” it added.
EFCC from our investigation has been carried intensive investigation into the matter having invited officials of FBN and the CBN for questioning over several aspects of the petition that bothered on financial crimes perpetrated by the Bank. But whether the Efcc can resolve these matters and how soon is what cannot be ascertain.
Mike Igini Chamber is demanding, “A refund to its client $135, 014, 238.06 wrongfully taken from our client’s account by FBN Plc; a refund to our client N3 billion and $10 million fraudulently diverted from our client’s accounts through various BDC; a refund to our client $1 million belonging to our client’s foreign partners, Total Marine Technology (TMT) wrongfully taken from our client’s account and a refund to our client $1, 800, 000 taken from our client’s account to pay interest on $9.2 million dollars granted our client by the Bank of Industry which FBN Plc unilaterally utilized and did not release to our client.
Investigation revealed that the Bank’s decision to sue Igini in his personal capacity was to prevent him from speaking publicly , “FBN is unhappy that a matter it has buried in court with unending adjournments since 2021 has been resurrected by Mike Igini
“The FBN’s suit discloses no reasonable cause of action against Igini as a solicitor’s letter of demand cannot be the basis for filing a suit and that it was a letter written on a privileged occasion. Igini, as a legal practitioner, enjoys certain immunity in carrying out his client’s instruction.”
