Erastus Akingbola

Akinwale Akintunde

Former General Manager of Tropics Securities Limited, Mr. Bayo Dada, yesterday told an Ikeja High Court that the 600 million units of shares bought for Intercontinental Bank (now Access Bank) by his company were purchased through loans.

Dada, who is also a non-executive director of the bank, is standing trial alongside former Managing Director of the bank, Dr. Erastus Akingbola, for allegedly stealing the bank’s money to the tune of N47.1 billion.

He told the court that contrary to the allegations by EFCC, his company, Tropics Finance Limited, in which Akingbola and his wife, Anthonia had interest, obtained separate credit facilities of N12 billion from Access Bank Plc, N2 billion from Intercontinental Capital Market Limited; N320 million from Intercontinental Homes and Savings Limited and between N100 million to N150 million from Associated Discount House, to fund the deal.

According to him, the transactions, which form part of the charge for which they are standing trial were said to involve the purchase of the bank’s share for the customers of the bank.

He said though his company get paid for the transactions but not immediately.

Meanwhile, the lead defence counsel, Chief Felix Fagbohungbe (SAN), yesterday also complained about the way his clients proceedings is handled by Justice Abiru.

Fagbohungbe complained of the judge’s interest to hear the defence’s case when the judge overruled his request for an adjournment to continue leading Akingbola’s co-accused, Bayo Dada, in evidence.

He had said he wanted an adjournment to properly go through some documents

But the judge, who had earlier in the proceedings expressed dissatisfaction over the manner in which the defence have been conducting their case, said Fagbohungbe’s request for an adjournment was unnecessary.