Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe: Court Sentences Fidelity Bank MD, Secretary To Prison
The Managing Director of Fidelity Bank, Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe, and the Bank Secretary, Ezinwa Unuigboje, were both sentenced to six weeks in prison by a Magistrate Court in Ogba, Lagos State, for not following a court order that said the bank couldn’t let a judgment debtor access his account.
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Magistrate Lateef Owolabi gave the sentence after giving a garnishee order on December 6, 2022, asking 16 banks not to let a judgment debtor, Prince Enabulele Ozaze, access to his bank accounts until he paid a N2.8 million judgment debt from a case involving the sale of a Toyota Corolla car.
In the main case, Magistrate Owolabi ruled in favour of the plaintiff, Jibrin Ahmed, on October 13, 2022. Ahmed had sued the defendant because he had given the defendant N2.8 million to buy a Toyota Corolla car.
In the ruling, Magistrate Owolabi said that the claim in front of the court is a summons used in an action for debt or a demand for money, with or without interest.
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He said that a liquidated demand is one that can be found with mathematical precision without any other research.
He then said, “I, the Chief Magistrate Court at Ogba, Lagos, have sentenced and looked over the whole process filed by the claimant. I hold that the claimant is entitled to judgment, not because the defendant isn’t there, but because the claimant has made a case that deserves to be heard.” All of the evidence given is relevant and trustworthy.”
The magistrate then ruled that the defendant owed the claimant N2.8 million for a transaction that happened in July 2022.
Court Sentences Fidelity Bank MD To Prison
So that the claimant’s lawyer, Alayo Akanbi, could collect on the judgment, he filed a garnishee proceeding with the court and attached 17 banks. He also asked the court to stop the banks from letting the defendant take money out of his accounts with them until the debt was paid off.
On December 6, 2022, the garnishee order was given.
But on January 25, 2023, the claimant, who was now a judgment creditor, showed the court in an affidavit that Fidelity bank had ignored the garnishee order.
He gave examples of how the judgment debtor had been taking money out of his account until he had used up all the money in his Fidelity bank account.
He said that as of January 12, 2023, when the garnishee order was given to the bank, the judgment debtor had N3,165,759.05k in his Fidelity bank account.
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By January 15, three days after the judgment was served, the person who owed the money had taken N725,547,80k out of the account. The next day, on January 16, 2023, N251,305.90 was taken out of the bank again. On January 17, the legal officer of the bank, Obianuju Nwosu, confirmed service on the bank as of December 22, 2022, and also apologized for the transactions on the account.
On January 18, 2023, the court told the Managing Director and Company Secretary to come to court in person to explain why they shouldn’t go to jail for letting the judgment debtor spend the money in his account after the garnishee order was served.
On Monday, February 6, the Managing Director and Company did not show up to court as they were told to. The lawyer for the judgment creditor told the judge that the two didn’t follow the court’s order to have their wages garnished.
In his decision, Magistrate Owolabi gave each of the Managing Director and Company Secretary a six-week prison sentence.
He also told the Lagos State Police Commissioner and any other officer under his command to arrest the two and bring them to court so they could be sent to the right prison.
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