As the trial of Francis Atuche, former Managing Director of the defunct Bank PHB and his wife, Elizabeth, as well as the bank’s former Chief Operating Officer, Ugo Anyanwu, continued on Tuesday over alleged theft of the bank’s N27.5 billion, a former presidential candidate and political economist, Professor Pat Utomi, has told the court his presidential election campaign between 2006 and 2007, was not funded by loans from Bank PHB.
Utomi, a former Vice Chairman of the bank’s Corporate Governance Committee, further denied that he spent a total N2 billion belonging to the bank on his campaign as alleged by the prosecution. According to him, the sum total of the amount he spent was N30 million.
The counsel to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Kemi Pinheiro, SAN, had, while cross-examining Utomi on the testimony he had earlier given the court, alleged that the professor’s campaign was funded by the bank.
He also put claimed the bank had advanced a N2 billion credit facility to Baywood Continental Limited, a company whose board was chaired by Utomi adding that the loan was secured from Bank PHB within the same period Utomi was campaigning around the country for his presidential ambition.
Denying the allegations before Justice Lateefat Okunnu, the presiding judge, Utomi said Baywood Continental never collected any loan from the bank, but that the company was actually indebted to Spring Bank Plc even before he became its chairman and even before Bank PHB acquired Spring Bank.
Professor Utomi said it was public knowledge that he never spent more than N30 million during his presidential election campaign. He thererfore described as a misrepresentation and misconception the linking of the indebtedness of Baywood to Spring bank Plc and his campaign.
Asked if the N17 billion cheque kitting fraud that rocked the bank, which made late President Umaru Musa Yar”Adua to invite him and Atuche was of no consequence to the Nigeria economy, Utomi said the interest expressed by the late president on the issue was on personal basis as there was an appropriate authority that should handle it.
According to him, “I believe that the president should have followed due process because it was not appropriate for him to resolve it with the Bank MD, if he did not had a personal interest.”
Utomi, a Vice Chairman of the bank’s Board of Directors, has constantly maintained that Bank PHB was stolen from the owners , by the powers that be maintaining that the loans advanced during Atuche’s era, which formed part of the charges against him were ratified by the board after proper scrutiny.
While reading from the minutes of the Board of Directors meeting of the bank held on July 9, 2008, he noted that the loans were ratified during the meeting by the members adding that the Bank Board even agreed to treat every loan according to its merit without making a blanket decision on the credit facilities, a process which, according to him, led to the ratification of the loans during the July 9, 2008 meeting of the board and that one of such ratifications affected the disputed loans to the company he headed as chairman.
The case has now been adjourned to September 20 , 2013, for the continuation of trial.