Fidelity Bank MD Sentenced To Prison
Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe, the Managing Director of Fidelity Bank, and Ezinwa Unuigboje, the Bank Secretary, were sentenced to six weeks in prison by a Magistrate Court in Ogba, Lagos State, for disobeying a garnishee order preventing the bank from granting a judgment debtor access to his account.
Magistrate Lateef Owolabi issued the sentence in response to a garnishee order he issued on December 6, 2022, requesting that 16 banks deny a judgment debtor, Prince Enabulele Ozaze, access to his bank accounts pending the payment of a N2.8 million judgment debt in a suit involving the sale of a Toyota Corolla car.
In the main suit, Magistrate Owolabi ruled in favor of the plaintiff, Jibrin Ahmed, who sued the defendant over a N2.8 million payment he made to the defendant for the purchase of a Toyota Corolla car on October 13, 2022.
In his decision, Magistrate Owolabi stated that the claim before the court is a summons used in action for debt or liquidated money demand with or without interest.
According to him, liquidated demand is one that can be calculated with arithmetic precision without further investigation.
He then said:
I, the Chief Magistratee Court at Ogba, Lagos has sentenced examined the whole process filed by the claimant and hold that the claimant is entitled to judgment not necessarily because the defendant is absent, but because the claimant has made a case worthy of being entitled to judgment. The totalities of evidence presented are relevant and reliable.
The magistrate then entered judgment against the defendant for N2.8 million, which is owed to the claimant for the transaction that occurred in July 2022.
To reap the benefits of the judgment, the claimant’s lawyer, Alayo Akanbi, filed a garnishe proceeding before the court, attached 17 banks, and asked the court to prevent the defendant from drawing money from his accounts with them until the debt was liquidated.
On December 6, 2022, the garnishee order was granted.
However, on January 25, 2023, the claimant, now a judgment creditor, deposed to an affidavit before the court, demonstrating that Fidelity Bank had violated the garnishee order
