NIGERIA: Construction Firm Slams N100bn Libel Suit On Unity Bank
A construction company, Bulet International Nigeria Limited has filed a N100 billion libel suit against Unity Bank Plc before a Federal C...
http://www.africaeagle.com/2014/12/nigeria-construction-firm-slams-n100bn.html
A construction company, Bulet International Nigeria Limited has filed a N100 billion libel suit against Unity Bank Plc before a Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court over alleged N6.8 billion loan.
In the suit filed by the construction firm and its Chief Executive, Alhaji Ismaila Isa, former minister of Water Resources and former president of the Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN), the plaintiffs denied receiving a loan of N6.8 billion from the bank.
Trouble was said to have started in 2013, when Unity Bank commenced debt recovery actions against Bulet at the FCT High Court and the case was dismissed. However, while the said suit was still pending, Unity Bank, through its lawyer, I. H. Yamah wrote letters to Bulet’s tenants and clients, including the Federal Ministry of Finance, CBN, Australian and American Embassies as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs conveying an auction sale notice (threatening to sell the property being occupied by the tenants).
The plaintiffs said the letters were false, malicious and baseless and calculated to mislead the public.
In the said offensive letters, Unity Bank alleged that it loaned the plaintiff N6.856 billion, adding that the bank was in possession of perfected legal mortgage over the landed property occupied by the tenants warning them not to have any commitments to their landlord.
The bank, also in 2014 further instituted another suit which is still pending in court and being challenged by Bulet for non-disclosure of reasonable cause of action, in which ruling had been fixed for February 2015.
Source: The Sun
In the suit filed by the construction firm and its Chief Executive, Alhaji Ismaila Isa, former minister of Water Resources and former president of the Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN), the plaintiffs denied receiving a loan of N6.8 billion from the bank.
Trouble was said to have started in 2013, when Unity Bank commenced debt recovery actions against Bulet at the FCT High Court and the case was dismissed. However, while the said suit was still pending, Unity Bank, through its lawyer, I. H. Yamah wrote letters to Bulet’s tenants and clients, including the Federal Ministry of Finance, CBN, Australian and American Embassies as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs conveying an auction sale notice (threatening to sell the property being occupied by the tenants).
The plaintiffs said the letters were false, malicious and baseless and calculated to mislead the public.
In the said offensive letters, Unity Bank alleged that it loaned the plaintiff N6.856 billion, adding that the bank was in possession of perfected legal mortgage over the landed property occupied by the tenants warning them not to have any commitments to their landlord.
The bank, also in 2014 further instituted another suit which is still pending in court and being challenged by Bulet for non-disclosure of reasonable cause of action, in which ruling had been fixed for February 2015.
Source: The Sun
