A staff of
Zenith Bank Plc Mrs Rita Ifeadi, a senior Manager who is also the Branch Head
of the bank’s branch at Bar Beach Victoria Island has found herself in the murky waters of the Economic And Financial Crimes Commision in connection with the fraud that rocked the Nigeria Maritime Administration
and Safety Agency NIMASA of about N2.6 billion between 2013 and May 28 2015.
She was last week sacked by the Zenith Bank Management for her involvement in
the alleged fraud by the Director General of (NIMASA).
click for the rest of the story.
Testifying yesterday, the former
branch manager with Zenith Bank Mrs Rita Ifeadi, explained how payments were
made to NIMASA staff even though they were not signatories to the corporate accounts
opened by officials of NIMASA with incomplete
and forged documentations.
She had
earlier testified that some bank accounts opened in the name of contractors by
NIMASA were operated by the agency’s staff, and that NIMASA transferred several
millions of Naira into the accounts, which were withdrawn or transferred by the
agency’s staff.
While being
questioned under cross examination, Ifeadi said an account could be operated by
another person in certain circumstances besides the person whose name is on the
mandate card. In such exceptional circumstances, she would counter-sign the
cheques before the beneficiary will be paid.
She said:
“There is an exception in KYC (Know Your Customer) that says if you know the people coming to pick up cash
on such accounts, you can confirm it. For some of those accounts, I know who
was coming to pick up the money, so I counter-sign the counter-cheques. Once I
counter-signed, the teller could go ahead and pay or the officer in charge of
transfer could ahead and initiate the transfers.
She said
Juan, who she said operated the account, was not a signatory to it, adding that
since she introduced NIMASA for the accounts, she knew who was coming to
withdraw from them. Ifeadi said the
exception was made because the account opening forms for NIMASA’s accounts were
incomplete. She went ahead and implicated the Banks complaints department by
saying the bank on its part failed to regularise the account documentation. Such errors do occur. And it was not flagged
by the Compliance Department,”
She said
when the case got to EFCC, the two “agreed they were the people signing on the account.”
The bank
staff also went ahead to list all the transactions she carried out for the
accused from NIMASA accounts to various fraudulently opened accounts she however confessed that she has never set
her eyes on the two signatories to the account. The trial was consequently
adjourned till March 23, 2016 Justice
Ibrahim Buba.
The
Director General of NIMASA Patrick Akpobolokemi was charged along with Captain
Ezekiel Agaba, his aides Ekene Nwakuche and other companies who aided the
massive fraud at the agency.They were charged by The Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission (EFCC) with converting
N2,658,957,666 to personal use between December 23, 2013 and May 28 2015, to
which they pleaded not guilty.
Rita Ifeadi
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