Rahamaniya Oil & Gas Boss Issues Dud Cheque, Flees To Saudi Arabia

FARIDA WARIZI, EFCC CHAIRPERSON. Photo: NAN.

Lagos (THEWILL) - Alhaji Abdulrahaman Bashir, one of those owing Intercontinental Bank Plc has fled the country after issuing a dud cheque in the sum of N12.8 billion naira to the bank as part payment for a loan he obtained in 2006.

Sources say the 32 year-old Abdulrahaman allegedly used his influence on the former managing director of the bank, Erastus Akingbola to obtain a N16 billion naira credit facility for the purpose of building a refinery in Kaduna before diverting the funds to Dubai to purchase choice real estates.

The businessman who is reported to be close to the Yar’Adua family has not been able to meet his loan obligations to the bank since the global melt down started. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission had invited him alongside other bank debtors for questioning after the CBN audit but released him after he signed an undertaking to liquidate the loan within an agreed period.

THEWILL could not independently verify reports that he tried unsuccessfully to seek the president’s intervention in the matter.

EFCC spokesperson Femi Babafemi confirmed the development saying the commission’s operatives are currently in the Middle East to effect the arrest of the businessman.

“Our operatives are after him and soon he would be brought back to Nigeria. We are pursuing him with all the energy at our disposal,” he said.

Intercontinental Bank was one of the banks that did not pass the audit test conducted by the Central Bank some months ago where it was discovered that it had N714 billion naira in bad loans.