Banks’ shareholders urge Etisalat to settle $1.2 billion debt

Some shareholder groups in the capital market has urged Etisalat Nigeria to settle the $1.2 billion debt it owed 13 commercial banks to avoid its takeover.

A cross section of the shareholder groups stated this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos yesterday.

They insisted that the company must settle the debt for the banks to meet up with their dividend obligations.

National Coordinator, Progressive Shareholders Association of Nigeria, Mr Boniface Okezie, advised Etisalat to settle the debt owed the commercial banks to avoid a legal action.

He said the affected banks should approach the court for receivership if the telco failed to settle the debt, adding that the banks had obligations to their shareholders in terms of dividend payment at the end of the financial year.

Also, the Chairman of Nigeria Professional Shareholders Association, Mr Godwin Anono, said the firm should settle the debt and desist from making unnecessary noise about the whole thing.

He said the transaction was in line with customer-bank relationship, noting that the terms and conditions must be obeyed.

Anono said further that the shareholders were in support of the banks to acquire the firm if it failed to settle the loan.

“This is like any other transaction, it’s not government business and I stand on existing protocol that the banks should acquire the company,’’ he said.

In his view, Mr Sewa Wusu, Head Research, SCM Capital Ltd., said the issue of loan between Etisalat and the consortium of banks was a customer-bank relationship which ought to be settled amicably with terms agreeable between both parties.

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