₦airaland Forum

Anybody keeping his money in Unity Bank should take absolute caution. Read the massive fraud going on there below.

David Hundeyin
Unity Bank Fraud: An Unfolding Story Of Nigerian Corporate Malfeasance
A former bank chairman has figured out the art of never running out of money to waste. Other people's money.

DAVID HUNDEYIN
DEC 02, 2023

Thomas Etuh Eating Unity Bank

Thomas Akoh Etuh is a very rich man.
He is the Chairman at Veritas Kapital Assurance Plc and Founder of the TAK group of companies, a multibillion naira conglomerate spanning Agriculture, Logistics, Asset Management, Aviation and Mining. His portfolio includes TAK Continental Limited, TAK Asset Management, TAK Agro, TAK Aviation, Thomasses and Associates Limited (UK) and Cape Cross Salt (PTY) of Namibia). Like many Nigerians of such considerable means, he made the jump from bank customer to bank insider, becoming the pioneer Vice-Chairman of the Unity Bank board of directors in April 2014.

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A little under a year later in January 2015, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) approved his appointment as the Chairman of the board.


What happened during the 33 months from his appointment on January 23, 2015, to his retirement on October 4, 2017 would become a case study in regulatory malpractice, absence of compliance, and the sheer, unbridled greed of well-connected insiders in Nigeria’s financial system. Along the way, a previously healthy bank would find itself completely hollowed out after giving out hundreds of billions of naira in Non Performing Loans, reduced to meticulously cooking its books while secretly operating with negative share capital for the better part of a decade. A barely-disguised distress sale to a younger competitor would then be floated as the solution to the bank’s woes, even as its erstwhile chairman would continue to lavish stupendous amounts of money on his personal business interests.

Other people’s money.


Bank Insider Fraud: The Perfect Scam
Former American bank regulator William Black famously wrote a book about the 1980s U.S. Savings and Loans crisis called ‘The Best Way To Rob A Bank Is To Own One.’ In the book, he detailed how the average, run-of-the-mill, successful bank robbery nets an average of $7,500 along with the risk of a bullet to the chest, whereas a moderately competent bank executive could make many multiples of that sum using just 2 basic principles of accounting fraud – Compliance Fraud and issuance of so-called Liars Loans. When the goal is a heist, the idea behind the 2-pronged approach is simple but effective. Compliance Fraud entails lowering internal controls and restrictions that normally limit the bank’s exposure to high risk activity such as subprime lending. Doing this allows the bank to vastly increase its loan portfolio in a short time and thus report incredible levels of growth – at least in the short term. Working hand-in-glove with this is the increased issuance of Liars Loans – loans that are issued with little or no due diligence by the bank, effectively taking the borrower at their word, which a bank is never supposed to do.

According to Black, there are always 3 outcomes whenever this financial formula is put into action. First, the bank experiences incredible growth in the short term, and may be able to report an impressive balance sheet.


158 percent balance sheet growth in just 2 and a half years…
Next, Black says, the top ranking executives at the bank become stupendously wealthy.


Finally, the bank itself suffers catastrophic financial ruin that causes its collapse if it is not bailed out or taken over.


According to sources from within Unity Bank, Thomas Etuh appears to have treated Black’s “formula” as an instruction manual rather than a warning, and the inevitable disastrous outcome is imminent. Etuh, according to these sources, was singlehandedly responsible during his tenure, for inflating the bank’s number of Non Performing Loan (NPL) accounts to over 20,000, coming to a total NPL balance of more than N400 billion by the time he retired. Of this unfathomable number, at least 7 seven companies directly owned by or linked to Etuh alone were responsible for more than N29 billion worth of NPLs that would later be wiped off the books using financial sleight of hand. The following images are excerpts from large data files passed across to West Africa Weekly containing the comprehensive list of NPLs shortly before Etuh’s retirement from the board in 2017.

The companies left unredacted are all companies directly owned by or beneficially linked to Thomas Etuh.






Fertilizer & Chemical Ltd, TAK Agro & Chemicals Ltd, SDEM Erectors Nigeria Limited, North East Gold Comm. Ltd, Keptin Fertile Acres Limited, Yam International (NG) Limited and TAK Continental Ltd are some of the Etuh-linked entities on this list of NPLs, as identified by bank insiders to West Africa Weekly. Entities linked to Etuh alone were responsible for a double digit percentage of all non performing loans on the bank’s books. Recognising that this would become a problem, Etuh’s next move was either evil genius or just plain evil, depending on your perspective. In December 2016, Unity Bank under his leadership struck a sales agreement with a company called Frontier Capital Alternative Assets Limited (FCAAL) to offload its total NPL portfolio – then worth N242 billion – for just N6.43 billion. You can access the full sales agreement here.


The deal of a lifetime
FCAAL by the way, is also closely linked to Etuh according to sources at the bank. What this means is that after personally taking nearly N30 billion out of the bank whose board he chaired, in the process inflating its NPL portfolio well past every regulatory limit in Nigerian jurisprudence, Thomas Etuh and his associates at FCAAL would then use a fraction of what he took out of the bank to buy its loan portfolio worth approximately 37.6 times more than what they paid for it. In addition, all collateral used to secure these loans were also taken over by FCAAL in the deal, making it a double loss for Unity Bank and a double gain for Etuh and FCAAL. But he wasn’t done yet. The sales agreement was modified in May 2017 to account for, among other things, the expected value of the NPL portfolio by the end of that year. At the stroke of a pen, the value of the loan portfolio sold to FCAAL went up 44 percent to N436,751,633,476.96 – but the price paid by FCAAL did not change.

Thomas Etuh had successfully masterminded the obliteration of nearly half a trillion naira of wealth from the Nigerian banking system in exchange for the risible sum of N6 billion.


Once again, the deal of a lifetime
Explaining why this is an especially bad deal, a source who asked not to be named said this:

It is important to point out that the sale of Unity Bank Loans to Frontier was under the pretence that it was helping the NPL of the bank. That is far from the truth because Thomas Etuh, who is responsible for the majority of the NPLs, has created fresh NPLs in the bank. The major reason for the sale was to cover up the huge NPL belonging to Thomas Etuh. Note also that the loans and its collaterals were grossly undervalued with no reasonable revenue generated from the sale (N400bn loans sold for N6bn.) Moreover, the sale eroded the bank’s capital, throwing it deeply into the red. In addition, Frontier Capital has made very little recovery most of which were at ridiculous concessions because it did not pay any reasonable considerations for the loans.

The problem with all this was that regardless of whatever accounting shenanigans could be enacted to hide the fact that Unity Bank was nearly half a trillion naira in the hole due to compliance fraud and Liars Loans, that kind of leakage could not be hidden for long. It was bound to show up on the books eventually and result in the first bank run in Nigeria since the January 2006 collapse of Société Générale Bank of Nigeria. Certainly if the bank were being audited by PwC or KPMG, such gaping holes in the balance sheet could not be hidden for long.



Which perhaps makes it rather interesting that the bank’s long-standing auditor turned out to be a little-known audit firm based in Kano called Ahmed Zakari & Co. The image below is its Lagos office. Feel free to draw your own conclusions, if any.


A picture tells a thousand words
Explaining the ongoing conspiracy of silence at Unity Bank, a current staff member with knowledge of the matter said:

With this criminal sale of the Bank’s assets, the bank shareholders funds became negative to the tune of about N270 billion. The bank has been operating with huge negative capital for several years.

Boardroom And Regulators Unite In Mischief
The Banks and Other Financial Institutions Act (BOFIA) 2020 and the CBN’s Prudential Guidelines contain multiple clauses that criminalise pretty much everything described above. The Prudential Guidelines for example, state that the maximum amount that can be given as a loan to a single borrower or group of related borrowers is 20 percent of the bank’s shareholder funds. Thomas Etuh himself claims that Unity Bank’s shareholders’ funds stood at N31 billion when he took charge, going up to N80 billion by the time he left. Putting aside the whistleblowers’ insistence that Unity Bank has in fact, been running with negative shareholders’ funds since 2016, if we are to use his own dodgy math, his NPL portfolio of N29 billion grossly exceeds the prudential guidelines both in the case of N31 billion SHF (93.5 percent) and N80 billion SHF (36.25 percent).


For some unspecified reason, both the Management and Board of Unity Bank showed complete disregard for these regulations and continued to grant loans to Thomas Etuh in amounts far in excess of the regulatory limits. The CBN meanwhile, appears to have entirely vacated its regulatory position where Unity Bank is concerned. According to staff who were in the know, the bank’s treasurer, Sunny Bakwunye was indicted by a high level committee within the bank for fraudulently diverting N13 billion belonging to the bank.



The recommendation of the committee’s report was that he should be sacked and the N13 billion immediately recovered. For an unknown reason, sources informed West Africa Weekly, this recommendation was never carried out by the Managing Director, and the Treasurer remains not just a free man, but also retains the job to this day.


Unity Bank MD, Tomi Somefun
Moreover, the inside word is that as the CBN continues to sit on its hands instead of regulating Unity Bank properly, the risk factor for contagion is growing within the Nigerian financial system due to Thomas Etuh’s insatiable appetite for toxic NPLs. The following memo to the board of the bank signed by the MD and other officials shows that Thomas Etuh has recently been granted new loans totalling N10 billion by the bank he quite literally ate into the red. Once again, the approval for the loan was given with no questions asked.




In case you are in any doubt about who is behind “Lighthouse Capital Limited,” the CAC document below should clear that up.



Worst of all, as confirmed by all sources, there is a plan afoot to cover up all these financial atrocities at Unity Bank by going into a merger with Providus Bank. This move is apparently being spearheaded by Thomas Etuh with the support of “allies” at the CBN.


Regulatory Questions That Need Answers
Ahead of any proposed merger involving Unity Bank, the CBN, NDIC and EFCC must carry out investigations to answer the following questions, failing which they might be exposing the Nigerian financial system to potentially catastrophic contagion:

What is the exact value of insider Non Performing Loans covered up in the sale to Frontier Capital?

Why was the N13bn fraud by the Treasurer covered up, and why were the recommendations of the committee never implemented?

Why and how has Unity Bank continued to operate with negative shareholders funds till date?

What is the role of the auditor in keeping this fraud going?

What is the true status of the new loans granted to Thomas Etuh by Unity Bank? Have they become NPLs?

Are there other directors of Unity Bank who are beneficiaries of these loans to Thomas Etuh, which is an incentive for their continued breach of the regulatory limit on insider loans?





https://davidhundeyin.substack.com/p/unity-bank-fraud-an-unfolding-story

sirchim:
I for take you serious if the EYEneck renowned CRIMINAL, send our votes in real time. Even THIEFNIBU Baban Baban BARAWOO know say, him no win the election. And him no go ever fit win OBI the Tsunami, ONE on ONE on the ballot, without rigging.

Old story that even your candidate will find funny.

Oga, tell us new thing.

Sallah ko, Salami ni!

This MURIC man is just backward in all his religious activism. Religion has turned the man m£ntal.

Jayhome24:
You are too funny and very very irrational in your economics studies submission.

So countries that opened their borders are suffering from influx of fake products

Sorry who is your Economics teacher or lecturer he deserves to be fire.

Mr. Know all, that means you know better than the economic team running the country at the ministerial level who knows it is better to keep the borders close for now. So go on and open the borders for them now.

Also tell me your qualification on International Economics before you start mouthing rubbish on this platform. An ignorant person claiming mastery on what he knows nothing about it.

Jayhome24:
So hiking minimum wage to 460k is your solution or to pressure the govt to stabilise the exchange rate and open the border?...

Our little knowledge in Economics tells us that there is no way the government can stabilise the exchange rate now without a commensurate increase in the national productive capacity and export. Also any unconditional opening of the national borders will only flood the country with cheap and low quality products from other country, therefore destroying our local manufacturers.

However the country is still relatively rich, let the wealth be equitably distributed by considerably jacking up the workers living wages to at least N120,000 to ameliorate their suffering.

Jayhome24:
No.one is oppressing me bro take that fact today because since 2015 when that useless Buhari came to power I had seen the horrible handwritten on the wall nothing is going to get better and I made a move to up my business game and diversified and then I warned people like you to leave political distractions and focus on your life you all insulted me and ended up wasted 8 years of Buhari with nothing to show now same you are doing, bro I "had crossed the bridge before the bridge was destroyed. (Wisdom)"

Bro I pays my bills without waiting for any damn politician seriously I don't give a f u c k who the hell any politician is I only support whom I like exercising my constitutional right by voting. You gerrrit

Good day..

No matter how much bragging you do on diversifying your income sources, I am still sure that as long as you staying in Nigeria, and you are financially responsible to some other people, you pocket is also affected by the high inflationary costs of all commodities in the country. And that in private you are grumbling about it as much as everybody.

Let us start from here:

tamdun:
We are not neighbours

So apt. Thanks.

ariesbull:
I keep saying if Igbo land is to be a country they will be like Luxembourg or Switzerland

So what's stopping the cities in your SE region from being like common Johannesburg and Durban in SA from all the allocations that have poured into the region from independence? Or are you going to import leaders from Luxembourg and Switzerland after your independence to develop your region?

Your leaders in your region are as corrupt or worse than those in other regions, so don't expect wonders from them.

1. FCT
2. Bayelsa
3. Delta
4. Lagos

post=130278304:
We Are Expert In Publishing ANY BAD NEWS.

Hahaa, hahaa! bad news no dey tire una?

All we are saying is give us good news!

This big grammar serves no purpose. Who and who are owing the huge debt, is it the FG or are they the DISCOS? And how much are these sectors owing individually and what are the mode of collection? That's all we want to know.

Madups:
worse thing Wey person fit do na to deceive himself.. SE still dey far from dubai but light years ahead of south west.. Sorry Sad waste.

Then why are your people running to the "sad waste" daily, instead of staying and enjoying their little Dubai where water flows everywhere from house to house?

Keep on deceiving yourself, we know better.

Madups:
imagine that the poorest communities in igbo land people practically beg u to fetch from their tap.

Hen-en! Then the whole SE don turn Dubai. Congrats to our new Lai Muhammed.

Akwamkpuruamu:
Wetin be him contents

YouTube na your friend to satisfy your curiosity. Try it.

Any coup now, there goes our free and irreverent gifts om Nairaland.

ElSudani:
One more coup and we should peacefully end the country. A mad man is described as one who does the same thing over and over hoping for a different result.

Not when the army hold the nation's neck vice like under arms and violence. Everyone will just shut up and comply with every dictatorial order from the top. Who wan die?

hammer567:
NO PART OF LAGOS IS SW.


IJEBU ARE NOT YORUBA.

THEY ARE NOT FROM ILEIFE.

When they start balkanising your former South East Region, removing South South and the Ijaw Nation from it, it will be far far less than the d0t region Buhari called it.

PresidObi:
Oga, you're passing a good message there, but the stream got muddled up from the source. Let me explain.

Lagos used to be a decent place to live and invest, till jealousy came in. Some tribes were said to have come to take over Lagos and chase the people who are neighbours there into their farthest states, and so unhealthy competition started.

People started importing misfits who had no business being in Lagos to come to Lagos just to cause problems and fight for turf unjustly. They were doing that with the tacit support of those in on authorities, tribal bigots among them. They just wanted to control the city, even if it means unjustly.

The miscreants they brought into the beautiful city of Lagos started causing more troubles, extortion, fighting, stealing and other social vices became rampant. They drank alcohol, smoked everything that can be smoked, abused drugs just to stay high and scare people.

At a point, they started forming gangs, and due to turf wars, they had to start joining secret cults for protection. It doesn't also help that the founder of the secret cults is a professor from the same region. What about a man caught dealing the biggest drug value in Chicago? He's from there too!

That's where the problem started. To solve it, you have to gather all those aguero in the parks and everywhere and give them proper education, orientation and help them find good work.

Tankio

Advice from another tribal bigot, infused with bigotry insults, who will take it?

Minime10:
In the North we celebrate all our criminal sons & daughters, our brethren in South West also do the same thing in celebrating theirs criminal sons & daughters too.
It's only those holier than thou people in South South & South East that condemn their sons & daughters that commit crimes and bring them out for us to crucify🙄🙄

Be deceiving yourself. All those Odogwu Malaysia, Odogwu Omah, Odogwu Southie and Odogwu Mexico with narcotics background, building huge mansions in your villages, which your people are venerating daily on social media, where are they from?

farouk2much:
This thing they surprise me. For long. But today is the day i will speak about it, am a devoted muslim and am so proud of my religion.. Why is it that islamic topic is strictly only for muslims. And Christian topic is for all..... Nairaland do something about this.
It's supposed to be islamic topic for muslims only..... And Christian topic should go with Christian only

Because uncouth christians with no home training tends to abuse and molest the Muslim religion in this ungodly platform.

Meanwhile I am a Christian.

So true an observation, and truer still is the counsel of equal treatment between pastors and their church owners or leaders.

DeepSight:
Lol. Says he who worships his fellow man and calls him God.
You are lost.

Okay, you will soon know, when the Devil that is deceiving you now, will molest and mock you at death, which is inevitable for all men. Then the meaning of the word "lost" will be clear to you.

As for that "fellow man", He has been tested by me, and has proved Himself faithful all the time. Try Him too before you discard Him.

DeepSight:
You really look at a Jewish man and call him almighty God. Have you paused to contemplate how enslaved you are?

At death you will know, I am not here to argue with you, since you are deep in your ignorance.

OredoPikin:
Its a remembrance day for their nation biafra and their fallen heroes.
This boy will never sense in his entire life.
Everything is not Peter Obi vs Tinubu
Grow sense

Does celebrating a memorial day for your fallen heroes justify a forced stay at home order given by a proxy and semi terrorist organisation, not recognised by law? Does it justify the killing of 0innocent Igb0 soldiers and civilians in Aba? Can't the governors in the east pass a law demarcating the day as a holiday, as it was being done before in the west on June 12?

rinzaugustine:
same way Fulani herdsmen have reduced your population and chased una out out your ancestral farmlands into Benin republic as destitute refugees

So why are your people still staying in Lagos and in various Y0ruba towns, or have they also run to Benin Republic?

Chibuezem:
encouraging the death of innocents is just wack.

So the soldiers and Igb0 civilians that were killed by your UGM and ESN were not innocent?

nony43:
Stop bringing fake news where the incident happens is outskirts of Aba, former Gov village it is called Obingwa LGA. What concerns Markets in Aba. Nairaland is one blog with one of the highest peddlers of fake news

So Nairaland is the Vanguard newspaper that carried the news? Are you afraid that retribution day had come so soon?

Lithiumite:
His supposed favourite people - the Israelites....why did he command them to plunder and enslave those he helped to conquer......there was no condemnation against slavery but rather a condescending empathy to save his children already in slavery .
During Jesus's era, slavery was equally prevalent and their was no such rebuke or comment against it but rather moralising it.....the parable of the servants and their talents readily comes to mind.

Allow me to teach you further on the ways of the LORD with my human knowledge of Him.

Let us start from the precept that God is not the author of human slavery, it is the Devil manipulating wicked men to turn their fellow mankind to slaves for pecuniary purpose. And as long as Satan is in this world, slavery in whatever forms it exists, will continue to exist until Jesus comes the second time to rule the world.

Then God is Jesus, and Jesus is God. And God moral compass is different from man's moral compass. Jesus not condemning slavery nominally in His days upon the earth is because it will serve no purpose, knowing the will of the Devil is to have men in bondage until his own captivity. So condemning it words, and not in action will not stop it. And because He knows a day is coming when He will arrive to save all men from bondage, then slavery, and all wickedness, will end.

And as for God encouraging the Israelites to spoil the nations they conquered, remember that God is not the GOD of the Israelites alone, but is the GOD and the Creator of all mankind. And He can use any nation to punish any other nation for whatever offences against His divine laws, but chiefly idolatry. The same way He used Israel to spoil other nations, he had also used many nations to spoil Israel at different times.

Lithiumite:
The reason why Christian ideology is so terrible,even Jesus nor any of the prophets including the entire bible never condemned slavery,not even a single sentence against it.

Your knowledge of the Bible is so minute. If God is not against slavery, then why were the Israelites rescued from their slavish existence in the pharaonic Egypt in the book of Exodus?

Also the mind of GOD is astronomically higher than the mind of a natural man, thus He knows things in an higher realm than man's.

And the encyclopediac vision of GOD is greater than the monopediac vision of man, thus He sees things in a wider realm than man's.