EFCC Report: Gov Adeleke Urges CBN To Carry Out ‘Fit & Proper’ Test On CitiTrust

Governor Ademola Adeleke of Osun State has emphasized the need for the nation’s apex bank, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to carry out ‘fit and proper’ test on the Cititrust Holding PLC noting that the firm getting declared as an illegal company alongside 57 others by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), a few days ago, has made him fear for the future of the Living Trust Mortgage Bank Plc.

 The governor in a petition dated March 19, 2025, which was sent to the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and had the Director General of Securities Exchange Commission (SEC), the Executive Commissioner, Operations (SEC) and two others cc’d, noted that it is important to launch an inquiry and seek necessary information about the history of the company in question .

  Governor Adeleke also emphasized the need to revisit the issue of the shares bought by Cititrust Holdings Plc in 2019 noting that a ‘fit and proper’ test will help to address the propriety or otherwise of such an action.

Recall that Alhaji Adebayo Jimoh, a former group Managing Director of Oodua Investment Company Ltd, had while in charge of the Living Trust Mortgage Bank Plc supervised the sale of its shares to Cititrust Holdings Plc in 2019.

Citi Trust Holdings Plc owns 41% ownership of the financial institution while Osun State government owns 40% ownership, the remaining 19 % is owned by diverse individuals with no single person having up to 10 % ownership.   

Also, based on the shareholders’ agreement, Citi Trust Holdings Plc produces the Managing Director, while the state government nominates the chairman.

‘Meanwhile, CitiTrust Holding Plc has been declared as one (1) of the fifty-eight (58) Ponzi schemes by the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC), with their names and schemes published on the official website of EFCC. There are allegations that the proceeds of the scheme must have been used to buy Osun shares, which will possibly expose Livingtrust Bank. Hence, there is a need for unbiased recertification of CitiTrust’s ownership of Livingtrust shares and to determine, if the entity, called CitiTrust is ‘fit and proper’ in line with various regulatory requirements. 

Also, what I think the CBN official should be focusing on, are the liquidity challenges confronting the daily operations of the bank as a result of various garnishee orders running into billions of naira against the funds of the bank. The orders arose from the action and inaction of CitiTrust and its subsidiaries in other business dealings that have nothing to do with LivingTrust. These Garnishee/ Mareva orders on the funds of LivingTrust keep rising in numbers, values and their life spans.

Also, the internal control weakness of the bank that has led to the various unauthorized drawings, on certain customer bank accounts, running into other billions of Naira should be on the radar of CBN staff for adequate loan loss provision.

We are willing to support your efforts and to shed specific information on the unauthorized drawings on the three (3) major accounts, with each ranging from 450 million to 2 billion naira.  Others range from 100million to 200million Naira each.

Our support will help to clean up the bank’s books and reposition it for growth’ the governor noted in the petition-Team@orientactualmags.com Do you have any information you wish to share with us? Do you want us to cover your event or programme? Kindly send SMS to 08059100286, 09094171980 or get in touch via orientactualmag@gmail.com.  Thank you