Consortium of 13 banks involved in Etisalat Nigeria’s 1.2 billion dollars loan on Wednesday called on the Federal Government to investigate the management over the usage of the loan.
A source close to the banks told newsmen in Lagos that the banks want the government, through the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to wade into the matter, by investigating what the company did with the loan.
The source alleged that the loans were siphoned and needed to be investigated by the EFCC noting that there was no proof of what the company did with the loan adding that the affected banks had rolled out a lot of viable options to Etisalat for the loan to be restructured, but was rejected by the company.
He added that the banks were not into telecommunications and had no intention of running Etisalat as they lacked the technical know-how.
According to the source, “All we want is to recover the loans; we cannot write off the loans as being demanded by Etisalat, because the company is viable”, revealing that Etisalat wanted the banks to write off the loan as non-performing, which was rejected because the company was doing well.
“The company wants injection of new capital and this has been suggested to the majority shareholder. The government should investigate the matter with all seriousness, to dig out the truth”, he added.
In the last three months, Etisalat Nigeria had been in talks with the consortium of banks, to restructure a 1.2 billion-dollar loan after missing repayments.
The loan is a seven-year facility, agreed with 13 banks in 2013, to refinance a 650 million dollar-loan and fund expansion of the telecommunications network.
Efforts by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) which stepped into the fray to prevent a takeover by the banks failed to produce an agreement on restructuring the debt.
The United Arab Emirate (UAE’s) Etisalat on June 20 said that it had been instructed to transfer its 45 per cent stake in Etisalat Nigeria to a loan trustee.
Etisalat said it had been notified to transfer its stake by June 23 adding that the stake had a carrying value of zero on its books.
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