By Peter OBIORA InvestAdvocate
Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-Bolaji Bello, Director of Finance and Administration of Nigeria’s Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) Thursday has been appointed by the Federal Government (FG) as the Acting Director General SEC as Udoma Udo Udoma, Daisy Ekineh and others tenure expires Friday June 15 2012.
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Minister of Finance, said there will be no tenure elongation for Udoma, Ekineh and other Board Members of the Commission.
According to her, Bello SEC’s Director of Finance and Administration, would assume office on Monday, June 18, 2012 as the Ag DG.
On the Board is Udoma Udo Udoma as Chairman; consist of eight (8) others as Executive and Non-Executive Members, these includes Arunma Oteh, Director General (DG) on compulsory leave, Daisy Ekineh, as Executive Commissioner (Operations), Lawal Sani Stores, as Executive Commissioner (Finance & Accounts); Charles Udora as Executive Commissioner (Legal & Enforcement).
The Non-Executive Commissioners include Yahaya Ali and Ronke Fatade and Daniel Kifasi representing the Federal Ministry of Finance and Christopher Chukwu, representing the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
It is expected that a new Board will be constituted after tenure of four (4) years.
According to a Press Statement on Tuesday by Edosa Kennedy Aigbekae, Secretary to Nigeria’s SEC on the order of its Board and made available to www.investadvocateng.com.
At the heels of 66th meeting of the Board of the Commission held on June 11, 2012, and directing Oteh to proceed on compulsory leave to enable an independent investigation to be undertaken in respect of the Project 50 programme which was carried out by the Commission in 2011.
The decision of the Board was arrived at after consideration of the report of its Audit and Finance Committee which had been directed to investigate the sources and uses of funds for the Project 50 event.
A Committee recommended an independent audit of Project 50 and that the key actors in the management of the funds should be asked to step aside to allow an unhindered investigation.
Following this, it was gathered that Oteh had taken up the matter with superior authorities to challenge the Board’s decision.
According to the embattled DG of Nigeria’s SEC, asking her to proceed on compulsory leave was a ploy by Members of the Commission’s Board to continue to extend their term of office which is officially expected to end Friday June 15 2012.
As earlier reported, a Public Hearing commenced March 13 2012 by the House of Representatives Committee on Capital Market and other Institutions; in Pursuant to its Resolution (HR. 103/2011) of Votes and Proceedings of Wednesday, 14th December, 2011, which will mandate the Committee on Capital Market and Other Institutions to conduct a Public Hearing on the Resolution.
Oteh, DG of Nigeria’s SEC fired back at Lawmakers who probed and accused her of abusing her office and embarking on reckless spending.
Oteh on March 15 2012 said the Lawmakers are not happy with her because she turned down their request for a N44 million bribe.
According to oteh, the Lawmakers initially requested for N39 million to pay for the cost of the ongoing public hearing, but her refusal led to Hembe’s request for N5 million; coupled with SEC sponsoring a foreign trip for members of the committee, and paying them estacodes.
Following this development on March 20 2012, Hemba, Chairman House Committee on Capital Market stepped down as Chairman of the Committee, in order to properly defend allegations of bribery allegations and to subsequently clear his name.
This led to the recent Compulsory Leave slammed on Oteh by the SEC Board whose tenure is less than 24 hours to expire.
