•Explains his regrets over encounter with Adaobi Alagwu
From: Ismail Omipidan, Abuja
Former chairman, board of directors, Skye Bank Plc, Mr. Tunde Ayeni, in a chance meeting with Daily Sun, spoke about how and why Skye Bank’s licence was withdrawn, just as he admonished men to avoid the type of relationship he had with Adaobi Alagwu, saying these “sorts of relationships come with short moments of pleasure, but with huge devastating consequences.”
Excerpts:
Your personality is synonymous with the banking industry, but you are a lawyer, how did it happen?
I am a lawyer and I’ll always be one. It’s a profession that I am always very proud of. It’s also good to mention that being a lawyer does not necessarily mean going to court. You can be a lawyer without going to court. The two aspects of legal practice are combined in Nigeria, by this I mean that you can effectively practice as a solicitor and an advocate but in a place like England, for instance, you can either be a barrister or a solicitor, you can’t combine the two. So, I still run my law office very actively till today, both in Lagos and in Abuja.
However, at a very early stage in my career, I ventured into business. After my youth service, I worked with a company that afforded me the opportunity to have a flair for business. The company was in the business of marketing products and also manufacturing goods.This gave me the background to venture into business and when I left to set up businesses of my own, my then CEO, who trained me in the art of making deals, Mr. Rodney Hecksher, who is partly Nigerian and of Irish origin, was such a dedicated and devoted employer of labour. So, I was exposed to business at a very early stage of my work life. I was the company’s legal adviser and his personal assistant for about two years and in that position I could see everything that my peers were not able to see.
After I voluntarily resigned my employment, I went ahead to set up my law firm where my other businesses came from. Also, at a very early stage in my career, I realised that what most business people need is the funding capability to succeed in business. You can have different business ideas but what is most important is the privilege of having the capacity to fund them to success. So, I made the decision to seek partners and we set up a banking institution at a very early stage to support my business ideas so that I wouldn’t always have to speak too much grammar to secure funding (smiles).
Was that how Skye Bank came about?
There was Bond Bank before Skye Bank. I ventured into the banking business at the time, not as an employee, but as a part owner. Those days, the value of the naira was reasonably good, so the requirement for capitalisation of a banking institution was initially set at N500m and later N2 billion when our license was granted. I was, therefore, on the board of directors of Bond Bank Nigeria Ltd, as a non- executive member. I’ve never worked in a bank as a staff, by this I mean doing day-to-day work. I was on the board of the bank till 2005 when we joined the group that eventually became Skye Bank PLC due to regulatory intervention by the CBN.
At the beginning of the operation of Skye Bank, I opted out from the board, at that time, I had a representation on the board but, later on, when I felt I needed to watch over my investment, I rejoined the board. I came on the board sometime in 2008 and I can confidently say that we did very well for the institution at the time in that we grew the balance sheet very well and brought in good businesses, the bank grew profitably well because everybody, including staff, board members and other stakeholders was very committed and, sometime in 2011, I was elected as the chairman of the bank.
Looking back at those moments, I can authoritatively say there is politics in every aspect of human endeavour. And one thing I used to say, and which I still maintain is, no matter how smart you might be, you can only see what is in front of you and hardly see what lies behind. For instance, 90 percent of the time when a bank fails, the non-executive directors may not actually be aware of 99 percent of the reasons that may have led to the failure. It always falls on the laps of the executive directors, because as a non-executive director you can only know what the executives want you to know and see.
However, no matter how much time you devot to watching, because you don’t earn income from the institution other than the so-called sitting allowance and you have your own primary responsibility of watching over your other business ventures that pay your bills, things tend to go wrong when least expected and, because our level of corporate governance in most institutions is still poor in this environment, there is a lot of corporate deceit that leads to corporate failure.
So, are you saying politics led to the collapse of Skye Bank?
Well, to a large extent, maybe or maybe not. The point is that, as an experienced journalist, you would agree with me that if you hold a public office for one month, no matter how prudent or clean you might seem to appear, if the powers that be want to find something against you, they will surely do. The same thing applies to banking. If the regulators want to find you culpable for certain reasons, I can assure you that it will be very difficult for you to escape. There are some facts that are very difficult and unwise for me to share with you at this moment but I’m sure when I’m a bit older or retired from business it’ll be much easier for me to do so (smiles).
But, specifically, on the story of the withdrawal of the licence of Skye Bank, I believe either someone else or myself will tell the real story one day but all I can say for now is, simply, the bank’s failure was not because we didn’t run the bank well or maybe we did not know what to do at the time, neither was it that the bank was not doing well; it failed because the licence just had to be withdrawn and it was withdrawn.
Away from banking and its politics, what can you tell us about the back and forth between you and your so-called ex-mistress, Adaobi Alagwu?
When people refer to her as my ex-mistress, I hate to even hear it because it’s one of the darkest moments of my life. I regret ever meeting that lady. Initially, I was trying to manage the entire episode to protect my family, reputation and legacy but it quickly became obvious to me that I was dealing with someone who would go to any length to take advantage and blackmail me with the support of her family.
For someone like me, who often avoids social media drama because of the reputational fallout it raises for business, both locally and internationally, I did not want anything that could negatively affect my image when cheques are being cleared out. Unfortunately, characters like this lady know this and they take advantage of that, believing that people like me cannot come out like them on social media platforms. However, sometimes, it gets to a point where as a man you just have to come out and fight your battle and that’s exactly what I had to do and it’s what I’m still doing. Like I said earlier, it’s a regrettable episode for me and I never wish such for even my enemy.
How do you mean, it never happened or how?
She and her mother are desperate individuals, and I regret ever having anything to do with her and her entire family. I don’t even want to remember that period of my life; it is completely blocked out of my memory. Most people don’t understand what actually happened. I can tell you for a fact that I’m not an irresponsible person and, with hindsight, when all these started and I saw all the red flags, I should have just walked away. I mean, people should take it as a lesson from me: once you discover that you are in a circle you shouldn’t be, just cut the line and just move on, let heaven fall if it has to fall. But I was trying to manage the situation, and I was doing things that ordinarily I shouldn’t have done, like providing maintenance, even helping with accommodation, and so on. Those things that I did out of the goodness of my heart were used to blackmail me and that was why, at a point, I came out openly to say I did this, it’s all over and I’m recovering everything that I can recover from her and her mother.
As we speak, the magistrate’s court in Dawaki, Abuja, on March 11, 2025, ruled to the effect that there was no marital affair between the lady and myself, and that I am not responsible for her child. In any case I was never the father, the child is not mine and her desperation to pin the child on me just goes to show who she is. It is, therefore, clear that the episode has ended. Now, I’m back in court with her to recover my two houses from her and her mother, which they’re still occupying. If the family has any iota of respect and dignity for themselves, do I need to tell them before they vacate my houses? It’s clear that people like them just like to reap where they did not sow but this time it’ll not work, they’ve been served the legal notice to immediately vacate my properties.
What lesson(s) have you learnt so far?
A very big lesson, and for the sake of my name, my children, my wife and my legacy, I have learnt so much during this period that it is only good for people to watch very carefully before they make friends. Because I have also identified the roles some of my friends played during this period. Secondly, just stay focused, and there is no need for men to have a relationship that has no meaning and has no value in it. These sorts of relationships come with short moments of pleasure, but with huge devastating consequences. As a responsible man, you don’t need it. It was a distraction for me. And from the bottom of my heart, I must thank my family very well because they stood by me, especially my wife and my children. At a point I had to come clean to them, they understood and till today they still stand with me. Even though my actions were not permissible, they understood and together we’ve been able to weather the storm.
Finally, there are some Nigerians who believe that you want to recover those properties because you went broke after your encounter with the EFCC. How true?
Well, I’m happy you’re in my house, and I don’t need to tell you if I’m broke or not. At least, I can feed myself and my family comfortably, by the grace of God Almighty. In any case, I must say this, I’ve never been a public officer. I’ve never held any government position in my life, so I have no reason to hide or keep any asset in anybody’s hands or in anybody’s custody and I have never also kept any asset for anybody. So, anybody who has that kind of feeling about me it is the figment of their imagination. And, yes, I have had a brush with the EFCC, but none of my assets was seized, they were not even in question because everything God has helped me to acquire was done legally, legitimately and properly through my hard-earned sweat and resources.
My encounter with the EFCC at first was when my friend, the late DSP Alamieyeseigha, was incarcerated; there was the suspicious and erroneous belief that I was part of the people that helped him out of the UK when he jumped bail. I was then invited to the EFCC office for interrogation. After a thorough investigation, it was established that I was not involved. As a lawyer, I can never involve myself in such illegality. This happened sometime in 2005.
My next encounter with EFCC had to do with the Skye Bank licence withdrawal, this relates to certain expenditures the bank did before the takeover which we did during my tenure as chairman, even though those expenditures were done in good faith in the course of business, and in the process leading to and after the acquisition of Mainstreet bank, some of these expenditures were disallowed by the Central Bank after the takeover of the bank. So, the CBN ruled that, because we took those decisions without approval, we should be personally responsible for the repayment to the bank. Those payments were what the EFCC had issues with myself and the former Managing Director, and the repayments are done with and the matter has been laid to rest.
So, none of my assets are encumbered by the anti -graft body. It is therefore strange to me as to where this ‘story’ often comes from. I’m sure as a journalist, you know that some Nigerians like to talk without facts, I don’t get bucked down with those types of stories, all I do is to always remain focused and committed to my business and not be distracted.