AMCON: Challenging economy has made us adjust our recovery tactics

Ahmed Kuru, managing director of the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), says Nigeria’s economic challenges has made the corporation adjust its recovery tactics.

Kuru said the fresh tactics have led to a barrage of sponsored media attacks that are intended to distract the corporation from its increased tempo of debt recovery.

He added that he had been accused of suddenly becoming high-handed in the pursuit of its obligors.

Kuru said there was nothing wrong with the way AMCON is going after the debtors because the corporation is guided by certain rules and regulations that mandates it resolve all obligations within the ambit of the law.

He said “AMCON needed to change its recovery tactics because the current economic challenges actually impede the ability of the Corporation to recover the debts”.

He noted that one of the major challenges experienced in the recovery drive is the fact that most of the debtor companies were already moribund at the time the corporation took over the debts from the banks.

Kuru emphasised the fact that AMCON does not pursue personal vendetta against any debtor but is guided by its statutory mandate of recovering the debts.

He pointed out that AMCON owed the country a duty to recover the debts and called for the continued support of the press towards enlightening the general public of its core mandate and role in the Nigerian economy.

WE ARE NOT BEING INFLUENCED BY BUHARI’S CoS

AMCON also denied allegations that AMCON was being influenced by Abba Kyari, the Chief of Staff (CoS) to President Muhammadu Buhari.

The government-owned institution explained that the correspondence which quoted as influencing AMCON is only routine transfer of information from AMCON to the presidency.

“Our attention has been drawn to a story in an online publication purporting that the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) is being influenced to make business decisions by the Presidency,” AMCON said in a statement.

“The said letter, which the story brandished, is routine correspondence between the office of Chief of Staff to the President and relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of government including AMCON to seek clarifications and enable briefings to Mr. President on issues considered as having strategic national importance.”

The bad-debt bank, which was set up to avert an economic crisis in over half a decade ago, said there is nothing in the correspondence that suggest Kyari’s influence on AMCON.

“There is nothing in the contents of all our correspondences to suggest an influence on AMCON in its business decisions or translate to prospecting business on behalf of any individual, group or organisation as the earlier correspondence on the subject matter clearly required AMCON to exercise due care in the overall interest of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”