Demands retraction, apology in 7 days
Ayobami Joseph l Tuesday, August 04, 2020
ABUJA, Nigeria- Chairman, United Bank for Africa (UBA), Mr. Tony Elumelu has denied any involvement in the alleged piecemeal withdrawal of N41 billion from Nitel account .
Tony Elumelu made the denial following allegations credited to Chairman, Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions, Senator Ayo Akinyelure.
In the report, Senator Ayo Akinyelure alleged that UBA made unauthorized withdrawals from the accounts of Nitel four times and technically stole N41 billion out of the N42 billion that liquidators of the firm deposited.
According to him, UBA withdrew N29 billion, N11 billion, N6.8 million and N22 million at different times between 2006 and 2015 from the accounts without relevant tickets or authorisations for that purpose. And liquidators of the firm explained further in the petition that officials of UBA have been hiding under a litigated N685 million it withdrew from the accounts.
But in a letter, Lawal Rabana and Oluwakemi Balogun, lawyer to Tony Elumelu described the allegation as false, baseless, and mischievous as neither him nor any of the organisations associated with him has ever been involved in or indicted for any fraud as was falsely alleged by Mr. Akinyelure.
The lawyers demanded a retraction of the allegation within 7 days or be forced into a fierce legal battle.
“Our Client is also alarmed and appalled by this deliberate peddling of falsehood and misinformation against an unblemished personal and business reputation, painstakingly built by our Client over several decades with great personal sacrifice and unquestionable integrity”, the letter added.
Tony Elumelu, the lawyers said has instructed us to, and “we have demanded an immediate open, public and unreserved retraction of the said statements credited to Senator Akinyelure and an apology from Senator Akinyelure for this false allegation and defamation of our Client,” the lawyer said.
