There’s been a lot of stories making the rounds concerning MTN and four banks working with the telecommunication giant, all of which have been fined insanely huge amounts of money by the Central Bank of Nigeria.
The numbers and the big grammar being thrown around may have confused many, but have no fear, we are here to break it down (more like dumb it down) for you.
To make this story more relatable and easier to understand, let’s call MTN a handsome yoruba boy – Mayokun. While we replace the country Nigeria with Enugu and MTN’s country as Oyo respectively. CBN is Agbalagbi (stay with me here).
Mayokun is doing quite well, he is successful and has been able to grow his business considerably in Enugu. He has even made a couple of investments (over $16 Billion) in the state.
Mayokun is from Oyo, and some of his competitors have a slight problem with him coming to their territory and becoming a success. Still they all have a healthy but professional rivalry, so technically, they are cool.
Lest we forget, Mayokun hasn’t just made a good fortune in Enugu, he has done a lot for the economy of Enugu.
Mayokun has paid in excess of 2 trillion naira in taxes and levies in Enugu. Did I hear you say pere? No o, that’s like one-third of the entire budget of Enugu in 2017.
As if that is not enough, baba has also invested over $18B in infrastructure development and network rollout with over 15,000 base-transceiver stations and the longest fibre-optic cable network in Africa (15,500ft). We don’t know how to explain that in simple English but you get it sha
And Mayokun currently employs over 500,000 people in Enugu directly and indirectly. Na beans?
In order to continue to grow his business and support the economy of Enugu, Mayokun brings some of his assets from Oyo. And to move these assets, Mayokun uses some banks in Enugu who also have branches in Oyo, since it only makes sense and makes the process easier.
But then all of the sudden, the CBN in Enugu alias Agbalagbi fines the banks N5.2bn and claims the process wasn’t exactly legit. Also asks Mayokun to return $8.1bn
The claim from Agbalagbi is that the transfer of assets did not follow due process and the appropriate taxes may not have been paid.
. . . But the plot, thickens. The Enugu government, courtesy of the Attorney General (let’s call him hard guy Tony) called out Mayokun again and asked him to pay another 2 billion dollars pere. Claims it’s back taxes.
Mayokun tries to be a perfect gentleman and remains quiet. Safe in the knowledge that this is all a mix-up that will be sorted out quickly.
However, Mayorkun can’t help but wonder if this is all just a witch hunt because he’s not from Enugu. (And also probably cos he’s from Oyo, which has plenty witches,.. just saying)
Mayorkun and his four bank friends are livid (understandably so) and are convinced hard guy Tony is just being a dick-tective. They can’t wait for all of this to go away.
Mayokun and his friends have come out to explain their part of the story but hard guy Tony is still persisting on colledting his billions.
That’s it! That is where we are at now. But we cant help to wonder at all the loopholes in Agbalagbi’s story sha. Why now? why all these allegations? What is the agenda?
We keenly wait for the latest update on this rather interesting piece of corporate drama.
CAST
MAYOKUN ……………………………………………………………… MTN
ENUGU ……………………………………………………………………. NIGERIA
OYO ……………………………………………………………………… SOUTH AFRICA
HARD GUY TONY ………………………………………………. ATTORNEY GENERAL
CBN …………………………………………………………………………. AGBALAGBI
THE BANK FRIENDS …………………………………….. DIAMOND BANK, STANBIC IBTC, CITY BANK AND STANDARD CHARTERED BANK
via: INFORMATION NIGERIA
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