Allegation of $350,000 fraud, my story, by Jim-Daniels Nnah

Jim-Daniels Nnah is the chairman of Biowish Africa Limited, a Nigerian company that deals with biotechnology products. According to Nnah, Biowich signed a contractual agreement with EnvironAid Technologies Limited, owned by one Chris Ihenacho in September 2012.

He said the contract empowered Environaid to distribute Biowich products (pictured) across Nigeria. However, Biowish said it contracted another company when Environaid reneged on the terms of the agreement.

Dissatisfied with the development, Ihenacho according to Nnah, sponsored a campaign of calumny against Biowish and also tarnished the reputation of the company.

Nnah also provided contacts of those who witnessed the deal between him and Ihenacho. Attempts to reach Ihenacho did not yield any result as his lawyers refused to comment on the issue and there was no reply to the mail sent to him.

Nnah maintained that Biowich is a legitimate firm, and added that it is the first company in Nigeria which NAFDAC legitimised to deal with biotechnology products. He said Biowich currently has franchise worth $21 million in circulation within the country, adding that Access Bank and Zenith Bank facilitated the shipment of the franchise to Nigeria.

He accused the Nigerian police of unprofessionalism and vowed to file a legal action against publications that were used to slander him.

HOW I MET IHENACHO

I was introduced to Christian Iheanacho by Joe Obue, a mutual friend in May 2012. That was during a visit to Nigeria. Iheanacho was interested in buying power plants from the US and needed one of my companies – IC&T Americas Inc – to help him source them from Caterpillar. After we found the power plants with Caterpillar for a cost of $6m, Iheanacho failed to make payments. He gave the excuse that he was yet to obtain the loans he intended to use for the purchase. There were several of such errands which failed at the point of making payments. In the course of this interaction, Iheanacho learnt about Biowish products and indicated interest in a master distributor agreement.

I made it clear to him that Biowish had another partner covering south- south and that our partner there had met his obligations but was awaiting the permit of the products.

Eventually, Biowish product samples were handed over to Ihenacho for trials while I returned to the US.

AGREEMENT ON BIOWISH DISTRIBUTORSHIP

On September 24, 2012, a distributorship agreement was signed but not without warning Ihenacho against signing the agreement if he didn’t have the resources to complete the process. He designed the agreement in Nigeria and sent it by email so we signed here, on his own conditions and with the consent of Uche Okonkwo, one of his lawyers. It even took him four months to do his due diligence before signing.

IHENACHO DEFAULTED FROM THE OUTSET

Things started taking a low when Iheanacho defaulted on the due date for payment. Initially, he pleaded for a grace of 30 days. After the expiration of the 30 days, he could only afford partial compliance with further pleading. There were serial defaults; on every occasion when compliance with the agreement was due, the only constant thing was the default and further pleading and push back of dates.

On December 06, 2012 Biowish Africa concluded that Iheanacho was unable to complete the agreement and accepted that he be supplied products for resale as a one off customer, eight weeks from the date of NAFDAC approval.

NAFDAC ASPECT OF THE AGREEMENT

The agreement also had the provision of Ihenacho securing a warehouse for the inspection of the products by NAFDAC before they would be fully imported into Nigeria. He kept defaulting, wasting time. He was coming up with different stories, so many excuses. Ihenacho is filled with lies. He told me that he was a chemical engineer but during the period that NAFDAC was supposed to do the inspection, we discovered that he was not speaking the truth. He is not educated, so he could not meet NAFDAC standard. Eventually, he brought Donald Amadi, his nephew to be the project consultant.

TRAINING OF ENVIRONAID STAFF

I came personally to Nigeria to supervise the training of Iheanacho’s staff and for the preparation of his warehousing facilities for NAFDAC inspection. Myself, Ihenacho, his lawyer and project consultant held a meeting on December 12, 2012, where Iheanacho said he was ready with the resources to complete the agreement. We resolved to reinstate the distributor agreement based on a forbearance payment of $50, 000 with the promise that he would make all payment before January 30, 2013. Uche Okonkwo, his lawyer wrote the minutes of the meeting and emailed everybody in attendance

The forbearance fee which he wired in December raised hopes that he would be able to fulfill the agreement on the next due date but rather than do that, he phoned to plead for 2 weeks extension and when the 2 weeks was due, he defaulted again and forwarded through his lawyer, a proposed amendment which he referred to as addendum where he wanted to be allowed to assign the agreement to resell a right he didn’t yet have.

At this point I told him we had had enough and requested that he complied with the warehousing/ storage requirements of NAFDAC so that Biowish products would be delivered to him on a one-off customer basis  or have a mutual termination in which we kept the forbearance fee while he received the original deposits, after all due set-off.

I GAVE HIM SAMPLE PRODUCTS

Ihenacho sent his son accompanied by one of his staffers known to me to my house in Houston on June 06 2013, to pick up some products which he said should be part of his final supplies. His project consultant can attest to this. I have the ADT security video recording of them picking up products from my house.

HE REFUSED TO ACCEPT THE PRODUCTS

After NAFDAC approved the products in July  2013, Iheanacho was asked to choose the specific Biowish products to which his deposits were to be applied but rather than comply he insisted that I come to Lagos for a  meeting with him and a new marketing manager/consultant he was proposing to engage. Since I could not meet up due to my schedule and other business exigencies, I told him that it was not necessary that I be there for him to receive his order. I emailed him that Biowish Africa chief technical officer – Dayisi Odugbemi will be on hand for every support he needs but he would not accept that. 

Iheanacho will not make an order rather preferring to run to the police to investigate obtaining money under false pretence. He wants the police to help restore the master distributor agreement which he couldn’t afford or retrieve his funds by coercion without the necessary set off, forbearance fees and part supplies he had received. He called me on phone threatening that he had the connection to stop Biowish business in Nigeria and that he would effectively drag my name in the mud and so his machinery is worked up in frenzy desperation to tarnish my name.

Biowish Africa is duly incorporated in Nigeria with its trade marks registered, it has all the power of attorney of Biowishtech Inc as well as all necessary permits from NAFDAC, the federal ministry of agriculture, national oil spill detection and response agency and department of petroleum resources.

Biowish Africa has shipped over $22m ( nearly Four billion Naira )worth of products into Nigeria since August 2013 after the products were approved. They were shipped by PSI our shipping and clearing agents, much of these products were imported through LCs and BCs through Zenith Bank and Access, so we are into serious business.

THE POLICE IS NOT BEING PROFESSIONAL

It’s sad that a national institution that ought to be the beacon of hope and defender of the law would be compromised by a few corrupt persons to become partisan in a contractual dispute. They claim they are investigating obtaining money under false pretences by Jim- Daniels Nnah. Now let’s take basic logic- where is the pretence? Am I not the fit and proper person to represent Biowish in Africa? What’s complicated in it that needs investigation, he wired money to the fit and proper persons through authorised channels to the US, where is the puzzle that the Nigerian police wants to unravel in the US?  Didn’t Biowishtech write a letter to the court that Biowish Africa had 10 tons of product awaiting NAFDAC permit to be shipped to Nigeria?

My lawyers went to the police and told them as much and the investigating police officer DSP Uwa spoke to me on the phone as well and visited our Abuja office where he saw the products. I restated the facts as attested to by overwhelming documentary evidence so it’s difficult to understand what they want to unravel.

I KNOW MY RIGHTS

The lowest depth of their desperation was their going to Igbosere to obtain a false affidavit and bench warrant for my arrest from a magistrate. The slander they are orchestrating through a section of the press known for cash and carry or the new term – stomach infrastructure undermines the integrity of the newspapers publishing these sleaze, it is also contemptible of the court that made the orders. How does someone win in court and get a flak?

We are only insisting that this matter be resolved based on the agreement not by the external intervention of a partisan police with a fraudulent bench warrant. We are insisting that this fraud cannot be allowed to stand.  If they had any inkling of how developed societies work, with the sleaze they have online, I should be in trouble for receiving the amounts they mention in the US for illicit purpose or fraud?  Even the bank which name they’ve mentioned all over the internet since January 2014 would have closed the accounts and ordered investigations. The beauty of the US is that there is the sanctity of contracts and infractions have consequences, so sleaze and slander won’t be of much help to him and his cohorts!

I’m certain that when Iheanacho’s finishes his mad dance and grand delusion of the absurd and decides to make an order based on the contract – Biowish Africa will supply him with goods right there in Lagos as we are overstocked.