…Blackmailing obligors won’t stop us from recovering our debts – MD
A civil society organisation, Empowerment for Unemployed Initiative, has expressed worry over what it called “the disturbing complaints against Mr. Ahmed Kuru, current Managing Director of Assets Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON), urging President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to take action and restore public confidence in the organisation.
Its national coordinator, Danesi Momoh Prince and national secretary, Igwe Ude-Umanta, in a press statement, Thursday, called for urgent action to address the numerous problems plaguing AMCON. They also raised concerns about institutional issues, leadership ineptitude, and allegations of massive corruption within the agency.
In the statement, the duo said “It has come to light that Mr. Ahmed Kuru, the Managing Director of AMCON, is allegedly involved in diverting assets acquired from bad debtors. There are also weighty allegations that the remaining assets were sold at significantly reduced prices to Mr. Kuru’s associates.
“Even though there are reports that Mr. Kuru has been questioned by the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) regarding these allegations, the outcome of the interrogation remains unknown, and the confidence of many Nigerians in the EFCC’s operations has been shaken due to past experiences and the pedigree of the immediate past EFFC boss.”
The group, therefore, called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to take a decisive action by removing Mr. Ahmed Kuru from his position as Managing Director of AMCON. This step, the CSO insisted, is the most precise and crucial measure to rescue the agency from its current predicament because of the sensitive and strategic nature of AMCON’s mandate.
Reacting to the allegations of ineptitude and selling of AMCON properties to self and cronies through his Public Relations Officer, Mr. Jude Nwabauno, however, Mr. Ahmed Kuru described the allegations as blackmail by some obligors who are already in court, bent on smearing the corporation’s image and rubbishing the efforts of the management to recover its huge debts.
Jude stated: “These allegations are spurious, misleading and wicked, to say the least. They are sponsored by some recalcitrant obligors some of whom you know very well. I do not think that as a professional colleague you would be deceived by these obligors that are in different Courts with AMCON.
“…any obligor that has complaints should complain to the courts. Blackmails will not deter AMCON from recovering the huge debts. The newsrooms are not the proper place of complaints from chronic debtors that ruined the economy of Nigeria. They should come and prove in the Courts that they did not borrow from the banks.
“If you know the process, you will even without contacting me call the person a liar. When you publish government assets in national dailies and call for expression of interest (EoI), it is open to all Nigerians that will meet the conditionalities. That process makes it difficult for favourtism. You need to know the rigorous process of selling AMCON assets.”
