NGN4.4 Trillion Debt: AMCON Set To Shame Debtors As Deadline Approaches

Just recently, the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) informed the general public that it has concluded arrangements to publish the full list of the names of individuals, institutions, and directors in its non-performing loans (NPLs) portfolio in national newspapers.

In a recent publication on its website, it reminded the public that in a recent meeting held by the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance, and other Financial Institutions, Senator Uba Sani (Kaduna Central) directed AMCON to publish again the names of all debtors, including prominent Nigerians, who were frustrating the effort of AMCON in fulfilling its debt recovery mandate.

As an act of magnanimity/kindness, the management of AMCON, led by Ahmed Lawan Kuru, as MD/CEO, may have given the debtors thirty days beginning from December 6, 2021, to January 5, 2021, to come forward with a repayment proposal or risk the embarrassment of having their names in the media spaces as recalcitrant debtors as directed by the 9th National Assembly of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Only recently, the AMCON CEO told both the Federal House of Representatives and the Senate that the non-performing loan portfolio of AMCON is currently N4.4 trillion, with about 83 percent of the debt owed by just 350 debtors.

AMCON is saddled with the statutory responsibility of recovering all troubled debts owed the Corporation through the purchase of eligible bank assets (EBAs) from eligible financial institutions (EFIs) during the different phases of EBA purchases since the federal government established AMCON in 2010.

Consequently, the AMCON Act Section 50B. (1) as amended states, "Notwithstanding any rule or contractual obligation as to confidentiality, the Corporation may publish, in the national daily newspapers, a list of debtors that have failed to meet their debt or other repayment obligation to the Corporation in connection with any eligible bank asset acquired by the Corporation."