By Ikechukwu Amaechi
Let me disclose from the outset
that Nze Chidi Duru is my friend.
I met him for the first time sometime
in 1999 through a mutual friend who is now late, Tony Anyanwu, who represented
my Federal Constituency, Ahiazu-Ezinihitte Mbaise, in the House of
Representatives between 1999 and 2003.
Both Chidi and Tony, vibrant young
lawyers, had won their elections and were waiting to be inaugurated when Tony
and I went to see him in his law office in Lagos
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| *Nze Chidi Duru (pix: vanguard) |
Upon inauguration in early June
1999, Duru became one of the stars of the National Assembly (NASS) of the Fourth Republic
Such was his contribution that he
was appointed chairman of the very powerful and strategic House of
Representatives Committee on Privatisation and Commercialisation between 1999
and 2003.
So exceptional was he that he was
nominated by the British government as one of 14 outstanding leaders in Africa
and attended the Africa Future Leadership Pilot Programme in Manchester , United Kingdom
For a man who believes so much in
capacity building and that politicians should have a “second address”, when he
left the NASS in 2007, he attended several management courses, including the
Chief Executive Programme at the Lagos Business School; Competitive Strategy
and Value Creation Course at the University of Navarra, Barcelona, Spain; and the
Privatisation, Regulatory Reform, Corporate Governance and Management of
Political Economic Reforms at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard
University.
He also ran his businesses here in
Nigeria
Until last week, I had not spoken
with him for about a year. So, I was alarmed when I read a story online on
Wednesday with the headline “Pension Scam: Ex-Rep, Hon. Chidi Duru, goes into
hiding as EFCC comes after fraudsters.”
I called him immediately and the
story he narrated shocked me.
The whole crisis has to do with
the First Guarantee Pension Limited (FGPL) which he founded.
Duru said: “The licence of the
First Guarantee Pension Limited was given to me in recognition of the work that
one did bringing to fruition the Pension Reform Act of 2004.
“Fola Adeola, who was then the
chairman of the Steering Committee of the National Pensions Committee, was so
excited and so pleased with the hard work that was done in bringing this into
fruition that one was encouraged to consider the possibility of also being a
player in the industry.
“I applied and was granted a
licence as one of the players in the Pension Fund Adminiatration (PFA) industry
and the name of my company then was First Guarantee Pension Limited.
“Eventually, I brought together 37
shareholders to be able to promote First Guarantee Pension as a business.”
Unfortunately, that seems to be
his mistake.
For five years, the company
struggled but the tide turned in 2010 when it became profitable, paying its
first dividend in 2011.
With that came the envy.
On February 23, 2011, the National
Pensions Commission (PenCom), the industry regulator, released its annual
report which categorised FGPL as the most improved PFA in 2010.
Surprisingly, one month later, the
same PenCom on March 22, 2011 wrote the board of FGPL that it would like to
undertake a target examination of the company.
The target examination report
PenCom presented to the board in June 2011 was critical of the way the company
was being run, asserting, among other issues, that the chairman should not have
occupied the post because he had insignificant shares.
But the board reasoned that the
chairman, who had well over N20 million worth of shares, could not be said to
be a chairman with insignificant shares.
In any case, the company’s article
and memorandum of association didn’t provide for a share qualification to even
be on the board not to talk of a share qualification to be the chairman.
FGPL questioned the report and
brought to the attention of PenCom that under the Pension Reform Act, such a
report from the regulator will be submitted to the directors, and the directors
are bound under the law to submit the report to the shareholders.
It is the responsibility of the
shareholders to vote on it and whatever is the outcome of such a vote becomes
the decision of the company.
But PenCom would have none of
that. The management of FGPL sued PenCom to court.
On August 11, 2011, Justice D.U.
Okorowo of the Federal High Court, Abuja
PenCom demurred and four days
later, precisely on August 15, 2011, dissolved the board of FGPL and appointed
an interim management.
Outraged shareholders petitioned
the then Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed
Bello Adoke, who wrote two letters on August 18, 2011 and September 8, 2011 to
PenCom telling the regulator to obey the orders of court and revert to the
status quo.
None of that was done.
On June 18, 2012, the court ruled
on the matter. In a 132-page judgment, the judge took umbrage at PenCom for
acting above the law and ordered that the interim management be removed.
The court requested the
commissioner of police in Lagos State , where the head office of FGPL is, and the
commissioner of police in Abuja
But before then, on October 3,
2011, operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had
swooped on Duru’s residence in Abuja
The EFCC acted on the petition
despite the fact that in August, the same Ibrahim-Imam and five other shareholders
out of 37 had gone to a Federal High Court in Abuja, seeking an order of
mandamus to compel the EFCC to investigate the target report – and the court
threw out the application as an abuse of court process since there was already
a judgment on the matter.
Yet, Duru was detained overnight.
On October 4, 2011, his sister, Mrs. Christy Ekweonu, a director with the
Federal Ministry of Justice; and Ken Nwanze, bailed him.
But, immediately after the court
gave the full judgment in 2012 nullifying the target report and mandating
PenCom to hand back the business to the original directors and shareholders,
the police invited the shareholders to make a report on why they were
disturbing the peace of FGPL.
The complainants suddenly became
the accused. In fact, the police went a step further to prefer a charge against
Duru before a Magistrate’s Court in Abuja
But on March 28, 2013, the
magistrate, after being presented with all the rulings on the matter, again
threw out the case as an abuse of court process.
Then in January this year, a
lawyer friend of Duru came to Lagos High Court and saw his name on the cause
list.
Investigation revealed that the
EFCC had actually come to Lagos
Worried by the latest development,
Duru now petitioned the current attorney general of the federation telling him
that his office had already written two letters on the matter.
That was on March 8, 2016. On
April 6, the AG caused a letter to be written to the EFCC demanding that they
should bring the case file to his office for review. But even a reminder letter
on April 22, could not sway the almighty EFCC.
Meanwhile, on April 11, Duru’s
lawyer and that of the EFCC had argued on his preliminary objection. So, the
ruling was fixed for May 11, 2016.
Unfortunately, the court didn’t
sit because the judge was indisposed. The matter was adjourned to June 8, 2016.
But as he was leaving the court,
he received a call from his sister who bailed him in 2012 saying EFCC
operatives were in her office to arrest her in lieu of the brother who they
claimed jumped bail.
But the law is very clear, you
cannot arrest one person in lieu of another.
Even if as a surety, the most you
can do is go to court, and get the court to issue an order for her to forfeit
her bail bond. She was in EFCC custody from that day untill Friday, April 20
when she was released.
Her offence? Being Chidi Duru’s
sister.
How can a man who was in court to
answer charges preferred against him by the EFCC be on the run?
While all these were going on, the
interim management appointed by PenCom, which had been sacked by the courts,
did a filing at the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) that neither had the
directors approval nor the shareholders resolution restructuring the
shareholding structure of FGPL where the shares of their South African
partners, Novare, were removed as investors and treated now as deposit for
shares and Duru’s shares were reduced by 50 per cent from N248 million to under
N122 million.
Duru’s tormentor-in-chief, Kashim
Ibrahim-Imam, was also purportedly elected as chairman of FGPL against
subsisting court orders.
On April 22, Duru petitioned President
Muhammadu Buhari, saying his life was in danger. He is yet to get a response
from the Presidency.
In all these, his prayer is
simple. “My appeal is that if it is found that there has been an infraction on
our part, then let justice be done, but if it is found that we have not done
anything wrong, and some other people have misused their powers and influence,
let justice also be done.”
When I went to see him last
Thursday, he was clearly traumatised and couldn't believe that the system would
allow this to happen to a law abiding citizen.
Chidi Duru is being persecuted.
This is not prosecution. What bothers him most is that the EFCC is using a
section of the media to brand him a criminal.
I have said this before, that it
is immoral, in fact the height of corruption, for the EFCC to use the media to
diminish a man whose business has been stolen from him, literally.
Ikechukwu Amaechi is
Editor-in-Chief of TheNiche, a national newspaper published in Lagos
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