The top two officials of Access Bank owe Intercontinental Bank, one of their competitors, more than₦16 billion.
Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede, the managing director, as well as his deputy, Herbert Wigwe, were named by the Central Bankas the third highest debtors to Intercontinental Bank.
The two executives are believed to have used the loan to acquire shares in Access, where their eight percent each make them the single largest shareholders in the bank.
Mr. Aig-Imoukhuede and Mr. Wigwe's debts are part of the ₦211billion owed to Intercontinental Bank by 35 individuals and corporate organisations. The inability of the bank to recover the sum, which is classified by the CBN as "non-performing loans", is one of the reasons that the bank is insolvent. It is also responsible for the sack on Friday of Erastus Akingbola, the bank's chief executive and other top management by the CBN.
Calls to both executives were not returned yesterday, although associates said they had since made good to Intercontinental so that their debt was no longer "non-performing." The associates also said Intercontinental had issued a letter to the Access executives confirming this. NEXT could not ascertain if this was true last night.
Keeping quiet
Calls to Mr. Aig-Imoukhuede's were not successful; neither did he respond to text messages sent by NEXT.
However, Mr. Wigwe, in his response to a text by NEXT, said, "I will get back to you much later." He said that his indebtedness to Intercontinental "has no effect on Access Bank whatsoever."
Several directors of Access Bank voiced support for their top two executives, saying they had never concealed their indebtedness to Intercontinental.


Reader Comments (31)
post a comment
* = Required information