The Federal High Court sitting in Lagos on Tuesday failed to sit to hear a suit instituted by Stanbic IBTC against the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria, FRCN, and National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion, NOTAP.
Presiding Justice Ibrahim Buba was absent and the proceedings had to be adjourned to Wednesday, November 4.
In the suit, Stanbic IBTC Bank is asking the court to determine, among others, whether FRCN has the power to impose a fine of 1 billion Naira on it.
FRCN had last week sanctioned Stanbic IBTC over its audited accounts for 2013 and 2014 and suspended the financial reporting numbers of the bank’s Chairman, Mr. Atedo Peterside, and its Chief Executive, Mrs Sola David-Borha, and also barred them from vouching for the integrity of any financial statements in Nigeria.
The body also suspended two other directors – Mr. Arthur Oginga and Dr. Daru Owei – for attesting to what it termed the “misleading” 2013 and 2014 financial accounts of the bank, as well as Ayodele Othihiwa of KPMG professional services for his firm’s alleged complicity in the infractions highlighted in the financial reports for the two-year period.
It based its sanctions on issues raised by the bank’s minority shareholders led by the Mahtani brothers who own the Churchgate conglomerate, to some other regulatory agencies such as NOTAP, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), among others.