By ROBERT EGBE

A Federal High Court in Lagos has declined to vacate an interim order through which the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) seized properties belonging to a businessman Jimoh Ibrahim for an alleged N69.4billion debt.

Ibrahim, NICON Investment Ltd and Global Fleet Oil and Gas Ltd, had in a motion on notice, prayed the court to set aside the order for “non-disclosure and misrepresentation of material facts”.

They further prayed the court to order AMCON to pay N50billion indemnity for alleged failure to conduct due diligence before obtaining the said order and for misrepresentation and concealment of fact.

But Justice Rilwan Aikawa, in a nearly two-hour ruling, upheld the argument of AMCON’s lawyer, Kemi Pinheiro (SAN) that AMCON made “full and substantial disclosure of all material facts” at the time of obtaining the orders on November 4, 2020.

The judge refused Ibrahim’s prayers and ruled that the order subsists.

Ibrahim, a lawyer, was in court, fully robed.

The Nation reports that Justice Aikawa made the interim order on November 4, and on November 18, AMCON announced that it had effectively taken over 12 properties belonging to the businessman and his firms.

The properties included the NICON Investment Ltd building Plot 242, Muhammadu Buhari Way, Central Business District, Abuja; NICON Hotels Ltd building at Plot 557, Port-Harcourt Crescent, off Gimbiya Street, Abuja and the building of NICON Lekki Ltd also atNo. 5, Customs Street, Lagos. (The Nation)