Over 50% of 3.7t debt has been settled — AMCON

AMCON has disclosed that it has so far been able to collect the sum of N644 billion debt from its creditors, and have also settled about 56 per cent of the total 3.7 trillion debt has been settled.

Managing Director of AMCON, Ahmed Kuru disclosed this recently at a media briefing in Lagos. Explaining that AMCON is on its way to achieving its objective of protecting the economy and retrieving acquired bad debts in the Nigerian financial system.

He further disclosed that seeking court orders in retrieving debts and sealing up companies was necessitated by many years of non-compliance from its debtors. “We always tell them that we are not quarreling with anybody. If I tell you that there is somebody who can put N10 billion on the table today, I’m lying. But I believe that there are people that can tell me how they intend to pay the 50 billion, the 100 billion, the 150 billion outstanding debts,” Kuru said.

The AMCON boss reassured Nigerians that AMCON is vigorous in all its dealing. “AMCON doesn’t wake up one fine morning and go to court. We must have given these people it for the last five to six years, but the last resort is the court; that means we must have exhausted all manner of mediation. Going to court is very expensive, and we also don’t like the bad publicity.”

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Kuru explained that AMCON, with a 10-year lifespan, was not set up to make profit as such, but to deliver a social benefit of saving the economy and businesses from bad debts, adding that it is not out to kill businesses.

“The most important thing, like we always tell our debtors is; come and talk to us. We are supposed to help them, we are supposed to support them, AMCON is not out to come and kill businesses, we are to support businesses, and we have record to show businesses that we have supported and we have continued to support.

“We are supposed to be the economic catalyst, we are supposed to help with the economy. That is why we always advice that let us understand what the issues are, so we can work together, because with 12,700 accounts, it is a basket where opportunities can come up.

“We just want to protect the economy, support the economy and we also want to support the obligos in their businesses, but they must come and talk to us.”

He said recovering of bad debts is not a pleasant, but patriotic assignment, adding that nothing is personal about the recovery of the debts.