Group petitions CBN Governor Emefiele over alleged fraudulent deductions from widow’s account

A group, Rule of Law And Accountability Advocacy Centre (RULAAC) has raised the alarm over alleged fraudulent deductions from a widow’s account.

The group revealed this in an open letter to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele.

The letter which was signed by Executive Director, Okechukwu Nwanguma, stated that the widow, Mrs Benedicta Onwuamegbu, the Managing Director of Madif Engineering Services Limited, Port Harcourt, Rivers State has been going through ‘tribulations’ in the hands of Polaris Bank, formerly Skye Bank.

According to the group, the sum of N220million have been taken from the woman’s account and the money diverted to the account of another company Anngood Global Investment Limited.

RULAAC also alleged that one of the Bank’s staff, Mr. Hezekiah Duru who is Mrs Onwuamegbu’s Accounts Officer, has an interest in the beneficiary company.

Part of the letter read: ”May we further bring to your attention the failure, refusal and /or neglect by Polaris Bank to reverse or refund the fraudulently withdrawn sum despite Mrs Onwuamegbu’s protestations and repeated demands through letters to the CBN.

”She also informed us that the said Account Officer, Mr. Duru has also been threatening her life in an attempt to intimidate her into silence and into giving up on her quest to recover her stolen funds. The Bank is also alleged to be spending money pulling down reports of this scandal in some of the news media where it has been published.

”Our resort to writing you an open letter owes to the fact that previous private letters addressed to you by the victim, through her lawyers, requesting you to initiate disciplinary actions against the erring Polaris Bank officials involved in the fraud and to make them refund the stolen funds have received no response from you and she believes that you may not show any serious interest in addressing the grave allegations of fraud by Polaris Bank against its customer unless you are called out.

”We request you, in your capacity as one who has oversight mandate and disciplinery control over banks and bank officials, to give this petition, the prompt, urgent and fair attention it deserves.”