First Bank Shareholders Move To Remove Femi Otedola Over Alleged Fraud

Some shareholders of First Bank of Nigeria Holdings Plc., have reportedly called for the removal of chairman, Femi Otedola.

The group of shareholders, who own 10 per cent shares in the company, on Wednesday, called for an Extra-Ordinary General Meeting to be held within 21 days, as provided by Section 215 (1) of the CAMA law, to achieve their demand, amongst others.

According to them, Mr Otedola emerged the FBN Holdings chairman by acquiring significant amount of shares with the influence of immediate past Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, Godwin Emefiele, adding that the bank’s former Chief Executive Officer, Adesola Adeduntan, assisted Mr Otedola, to take over the bank, as ordered by Mr Emefiele.

They claimed that Mr Otedola became a non-executive of the bank but without security clearance by the State Security Service and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

After the takeover however, Mr Otedola ousted Mr Adeduntan; the then bank chairman, Tunde Hassan-Odukale; Executive Director Tosin Adewuyi; Group Head, Folake Ani-Mumuney; including a journalist and non-executive director of the bank subsidiary, Ijeoma Nwogwugwu, for authoring a critical article.

Stakeholders claimed that with Mr Otedola as chairman, his personal employee at Holdco, and another at the bank, he had seized control of the bank and did what he wanted. They also feared that with the private placement of N360 billion shares, he would have absolute control and turn First Bank to his piggy bank without checks, balances and corporate governance.

They believe that if not for Mr Emefiele, Mr Otedola could not have passed the fit and proper test, after he ruined several banks with non-performing loans sold to AMCON.

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ThisDay reports that the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), has granted Mr Otedola a $45 to 50 million loan, which is about N90 billion. According to a source, the loan will “enable him (Otedola) to take full control during the proposed N360 billion private placement. But some of the shareholders are saying instead of a private placement for shares of the bank, it should be by right issue or public offer.”

A source also alleged that Mr Otedola’s preference for private placement is targeted at gaining control of the financial institution as his private estate.

This development comes after the recent organisational shakeup, which witnessed about 100 senior staff members being laid-off, including top executives, for its corporate restructuring and repositioning plan for 2025, after the confirmation of Olusegun Alebiosu as the bank’s managing director and chief executive officer (CEO) in June 2024.