5000 debtors gone into hiding – AMCON

The Managing Director Assets Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON), Ahmed Kuru has said that more than 5000 debtors have gone into hiding. Kuru who disclosed this in Lagos over the weekend at press briefing said that most of debtors have relocated making it difficult for the agency to trace them. He, however, said that “by next week or next month AMCON will start publishing a list of debtors, so that they can come to us rather than going into hiding.” He also explained that before AMCON could go to court, the company must have been talking to the debtor for up to 5 years. The AMCON boss, explained that there were certain types of obligors that cannot pay their debts, adding that though their values may have diminished, the AMCON Act does not allow the management to write them off like the banks, until the winding down of the corporation. Speaking further he said “at the end, if there is any outstanding, we hand them over to NDIC and CBN. One thing is certain. Even if you extend the life of AMCON for 20 years, it will not be able to recover all the loans. By 2023 to 2024, the corporation is expected to wind down. However, the banks will continue to contribute to the sinking fund. If after operating for 10 years, in addition to 2 to 5 years when the facilities were still domiciled with the commercial banks and we couldn’t do anything, it means there is nothing else we can do.” “The issue is that the moment we continue to allow organizations like this to continue to exist for a long time, it encourages rascality in the credit administration system.” He stated that experience has shown that quite a lot of businesses have gone down because of governance issues. For instance, he said in aviation industry, there is no airline in Nigeria that has operated for 10 years successfully without problems such that we can say that this is a model of an airline. He said there was a fundamental structural problem, adding that people must be held accountable for any form of impunity. Kuru stated that it was human beings that are responsible for problems experiencing in the companies. In his explanation, he said “When you give people a perfect document they look for where there is loophole. If there is none, they create one on the document. Since 1999, it is only this week that Nigeria convicted only one governor. People go away with any form of impunity