Former President, Nigerian Institute of Management (NIM), Mr. Abayomi Ojikutu, has asked Federal High Court, Lagos, to compel Fidelity Bank to pay him N25 million for dishonouring a bank manager’s cheque that was returned unpaid.

While Ojikutu contended that he has enough funds in his account domiciled at the Kofo Abayomi Street, Victoria Island Lagos branch to fund the transaction, Fidelity Bank, on the other hand, admitted returning the cheque unpaid due to “human error.”

Ojikutu is, however, not satisfied with the bank’s explanation and is insisting on damages for “negligently and maliciously dishonouring the bank’s manager’s cheque of N1,200,000 to a third party.”

News Express learnt that the former NIM boss, now a management consultant, issued the returned cheque number 5036363 for N1,200,000 in favour of his landlady, Mrs. Esther Olubukola Balogun, on May 16, 2013. However, when the manager’s cheque was presented by Balogun through her bankers, GTBank, the cheque was returned unpaid, an action Ojikutu said made him to be regarded as a “person not credible to be dealing with cheques.”

Upon a protest to the bank, Okechukwu Eke and Kingsley Ohiri both of Fidelity Bank’s Legal Services Division, in a letter dated July 15, 2013 to Ojikutu’s lawyer, Ladipo Fasade apologised, adding that “the return of the cheque was an unfortunate human error in the processing of the instrument. This is deeply regretted.”

Both Eke and Ohiri in the letter concluded: “Notwithstanding that your client has since cancelled and reissued the cheque to the same beneficiary, we have also written to the beneficiary to explain that the error leading to the return of the cheque was entirely ours.”

•Photo shows Fidelity Bank MD, Reginald Ihejiahi.

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