Resolving AMCON Debt In Oil & Gas, Power Sectors Will Boost Production, Generate Forex – Alade

2nd September 2024

The Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) has concluded plans to engage some of the best globally renowned Asset Tracers to go after the huge assets recalcitrant obligors have hidden in different shores across the globe. This was disclosed today by the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation Mr. Gbenga Alade.

The AMCON CEO who was meeting with business editors and top media executives across different media sectors for the first time since his assumption of office said having consulted widely with different stakeholders including the relevant committees of the National Assembly, the Judiciary, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Federal Ministry of Finance, the new Executive of AMCON has resolved to leave no stone unturned in its debt recovery drive. He said AMCON would also need the firm support of the media to ensure that these debtors are not allowed to escape with our commonwealth.

According to him, the AMCON Act as amended has empowered the Corporation on the different strategies that could be employed and deployed in the pursuit of defiant debtors but even at that, Alade said the “Nigerian System” makes it extremely difficult to go after AMCON obligors the way asset management companies go after debtors in other climes.

Having settled in as AMCON CEO since April, Alade said he has discovered why upon appointment those who called to congratulate him never failed to say he was up against the tide. He said, “I am beginning to understand that the AMCON job is more difficult than I thought. As Executive Management of AMCON or staff, you are not only fighting the obligors, you are also fighting the “Nigerian System”, tribal issues, geo-political interests, and all other mundane issues that do not matter in places like the United Kingdom where I was working before my appointment.

The debt recovery agency of the Federal Government of Nigeria is carrying a debt burden of nearly N5trillion even though it has recovered over N1.9trillion since it was created. Within the five months of Alade’s administration, and despite the challenging economic realities, AMCON has also recovered nearly a hundred billion.

Explaining some of the challenges to the media on Monday, Alade said, that out there in other countries, once you are a debtor, first the system will make it difficult for you to access further loans. Secondly, there are straightforward processes of realising the debt or coercing the obligor to pay. But in Nigeria, the obligors will hide under some technicalities of the law to tie AMCON down in different courts and the “Nigerian System” has continued to allow that.

He said it is for that reason that the new leadership of AMCON is working with relevant stakeholders to ensure that this trend does not continue.

It is on that note that AMCON will among other strategies intensify asset tracing of the obligors in different countries. The AMCON Act empowers the Corporation to carry out asset tracing not just in Nigeria but wherever the obligors hid them.

The AMCON CEO also highlighted four key sectors that the new management has chosen to focus on. They include oil and gas, power, telecommunications, and aviation. He expressed confidence that resolving issues surrounding AMCON assets in the oil and gas sector will boost production, generate more foreign exchange, and create employment opportunities for citizens.