An order of Mareva injunction prohibiting all Nigerian commercial banks and financial institutions from releasing any funds or assets up to $225,802,379.69 to General Hydrocarbons Limited—the outstanding loan owed to First Bank Nigeria as of September 30, 2024—has been issued by the Federal High Court in Lagos.
The court order followed a lawsuit in which General Hydrocarbons Limited and fifteen other people were named as defendants, and First Bank of Nigeria Limited and FBNQuest Trustees Limited were named as the first and second plaintiffs, respectively.
FBN asserted in the lawsuit filed under the filing number FHC/L/CS/2378/2024 that the $225.8 million was the remaining balance on the loan that the defendants had taken out for Oil Mining Lease 120.
According to the lawsuit, Mr. Nduka Obaigbena, Efe Damilola Obaigbena, and Olabisi Obaigbena are General Hydrocarbons’ directors.
Additionally, the plaintiffs requested permission to use courier service to serve the originating summons in the matter on the tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, and fifteenth defendants. They also requested permission to require the defendants to appear in court within 30 days of the originating process being served.
Banks are prohibited by the order from releasing or handling any funds or assets owed to the first defendant from any account that the first defendant, their agents, privies, subsidiaries, or sister firms keep.
Pending the hearing and decision of the motion on notice for interlocutory injunction, Justice D.I. Dipeolu, who issued the order, also prohibited the eighth through sixteenth defendants and any other third parties from handling any assets and receivables associated with OML 120 “without depositing the proceeds thereof to the first defendant’s account in the first plaintiff’s bank.”
Within seven days of serving this court order on them, the judge also ordered all Nigerian commercial banks and other financial institutions “to file and serve on the plaintiffs/applicants’ solicitors an affidavit disclosing the sum standing to the first to fourth defendants’ credit with a duly certified statement of accounts of the first to fourth defendants/respondents in their respective custody from the date of its opening till the date this order is served on the banks.”
Additionally, Dipeolu directed the eighth through thirteenth defendants “to file and serve on the plaintiffs/applicants a statement disclosing the quantum of products lifted from the eighth defendant or OML 120 since the commencement of production of OML 120.”
Until the motion on notice for an interlocutory injunction is heard and decided, the court prohibited the first, second, third, and fourth defendants, as well as their agents, proxies, or allies, “from transferring and or dissipating, diminishing, or dealing with any interest in the first defendant’s assets, including but not limited to crude stock, insurance policies, all forms of stock of shares, all forms of receivables, and contracts which have been pledged as securities for the loan facilities granted by the first plaintiff to the first defendant.”
Additionally, while the request on notice for an interlocutory injunction is being decided, the court prohibited the second and fourth defendants, who are directors of General Hydrocarbons, “from transferring and/or dissipating any interest in their assets wherever located in Nigeria, movable or immovable.”
The court further ordered, “That an order of mareva injunction is granted restraining all commercial banks in Nigeria and all other financial institutions operating in Nigeria from releasing or dealing in any manner whatsoever with any and all monies and/or assets due to the second to fourth defendants from any account whatsoever maintained by the second to fourth defendants and also all accounts associated with BVN 22220558365 (second defendant), 22363940584 (3rd defendant), and 22363940584 (fourth defendant), with any of the said banks wherever situated up to the amount of the plaintiffs/applicants’ total claim in the sum of US$225,802,379.69, which is the indebtedness on the first defendant’s account with the plaintiffs/applicants as of 30 September 2024, in respect of the loan facilities granted to the first defendant by the first plaintiff/applicant pending the hearing and determination of motion on notice for interlocutory injunction.
“That an order of interim injunction is granted restraining the first to fourth defendants, agents, servants, officers, privies, subsidiaries, sister companies, or any other person, natural or artificial, who is under the control of the fifth to fourth defendants, from transferring or dealing with any and all of the money standing to the credit of the first to fourth defendants in any account whatsoever maintained by the first to fourth defendants with any of the aforementioned banks wherever situated up to the amount of the plaintiff/applicant’s claim of the total sum of US$225,802,379.69 being the indebtedness on the defendant’s account with the first plaintiff/applicant as of September 30, 2024, regarding the loan facilities granted to the first defendant by the first plaintiff/applicant, while the motion on notice for interlocutory injunction is heard and decided.
The plaintiffs are permitted to issue the originating summons for the 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, and 15th defendants for service outside of Nigeria concurrently with the originating summons for service within Nigeria, the court further ordered.
The plaintiffs/applicants are given permission to serve the original summons in this case on the tenth, eleventh, thirteenth, and fifteenth defendants by using the DHL courier service at the tenth defendant’s address at Place des Begues 3, 1201 & 1211 Geneva, Switzerland; the eleventh defendant’s address at 50 Rue Due Rhone 1204 Geneva, Switzerland; the twelfth defendant’s address at 10 Collyer Quay, Ocean Financial Centre, Singapore; the thirteenth defendant’s address at 18 Hanover Square, London, England; and the fifteenth defendant’s address at 555 Phaholyothim road, the seventeenth floor, Rasa tower, Chatuchak, Bangkok, Thailand.
“That the defendants ranked 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, and 15th must appear before this Honorable Court within 30 days of the date the original process was served.”
However, the judge mandated that FBN submit an assurance to pay the defendants’ costs “if these orders ought not to have been granted.”
In order to hear the motion on notice, the matter was postponed until January 20.
Nduka Obaigbena, Vitol SA, Mercuria Energy Trading SA, Trafigura PTE Limited, Glencore Energy UK Limited, Schlumberger Nigeria Limited, Schlumbberger Overseas SA, Aimonte Nigeria Limited, Calidin Global Resources Limited, CESL Oyo Production BBS Limited, CESL Oyo Production O & MM Limited, and others are also defendants in the case.
However, Obaigbena described how he arranged a meeting between Mele Kyari, the Managing Director of NNPC Limited, and Oba Otudeko, the Chairman of FBN Holdings at the time, in 2020 in a letter dated November 7, 2024, to Yemi Cardoso, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, which Premium Times was able to view.
His issue was that the security documentation for the now-bad, non-performing loan to Atlantic Energy Drilling Concept Nigeria Limited (Atlantic Energy) for OML 26, OML 42, OML 30, and OML 34 had not been signed by the NNPC, which was then led by the late Maikanti Baru, the GMD of NNPC. In the letter, Obaigbena said, “The NNPC claimed that the then-Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, had orchestrated a fraudulent scheme to defraud the Federal Government through separate Strategic Alliance Agreements between Atlantic Energy and NPDC Limited.”
First Bank and General Hydrocarbons apparently came to an arrangement based on Mr. Obaigbena’s OML award after a series of discussions.
According to the letter, First Bank allegedly sold AMCON its remaining exposure as an Eligible Bank Asset (EBA) at a discount, with the money received from the sale of General Hydrocarbons being used to settle the debt.
According to the Editor-in-Chief of THISDAY, First Bank, AMCON, and General Hydrocarbons executed a tripartite deed on outstanding exposure, which enabled General Hydrocarbons to ensure the payment of a $600 million (in naira) outstanding exposure that is now discounted on the bank’s records.
He said the agreement was in return for First Bank funding the best possible exploration, development, and production of OML 120.
FBN’s account, which was subsequently classified by the Central Bank of Nigeria, was once again whole after GHL signed the Outstanding Exposure Tripartite Deed on December 31, 2021. The bank recorded a profit of N151 billion for the year ended December 31, 2021, after avoiding a loan loss provision of N302 billion, according to the document.
FBN’s 2021 loss would have been N161 billion if GHL had not signed and guaranteed the EBA to AMCON. This is a startling sum for the financial industry at the time, when the exchange rate was N400 to $1. Considering that the debt had been categorized as non-performing since 2015 (six years earlier), this was very noteworthy.
Obaigbena claimed that the bank violated the Outstanding Exposure Tripartite Deed by thereafter putting barriers in the way of funding the development of OML 120.
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