Why CBN should sanction eight banks over N700m former N/Airways workers

Presently, eight of the surviving commercial banks in the country have been enmeshed in an unprofessional conduct which if not well handled may dent their integrity for long.

The eight banks affected  have failed the integrity test by clinging on to the extra money running to N700 million the Federal Government through the office of the Accountant General mistakenly overpaid into the accounts of some former workers of the defunct Nigeria Airways.

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All efforts made by government, the union representatives of the former workers and even personal efforts of the affected workers directly to prevail on the banks to return the money back to the coffers of the government yielded no fruit as the banks continued to play the smart game on them.

While these banks continued in the dirty game, some of the workers who had suffered for fifteen years to get their final entitlements from the subsequent governments until their prayers were answered under the present one, were forced by the banks to continue to wait anxiously for the banks to do the needful for them to also receive their own entitlement though not in full.

As the government and the affected workers continued to mount pressure on the banks, the banks on the contrary took pleasure in trading with the blood of the hitherto dejected and frustrated workers many of whom had died while many of those alive have become a ghost of themselves due to years of neglect.

It took the intervention of the media and the threat of the unions to commence the picketing of their office this week before the banks could suddenly rediscover their questionable integrity to begin to refund the money.

The banks may attribute their actions to that of being enterprising or whatever, but one obvious thing is that they can still be enterprising according to the rules and games of the profession devoid of unprofessionalism and lack of integrity.

Since the unprofessional attitude of the eight banks were made public last week, they are now running around to refund the money which they could have done with integrity.

Already, the aviation unions have sent a serious petition to the minister of State for aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika asking him to prevail on the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to sanction the affected banks for their unprofessional conducts.

To many of the former Airways workers, there is the need for the CBN to ????? the big stick on the eight erring banks in view of the unethical conduct they have displayed which the workers argued to have further added to the psychological torture they had been subjected to since the national carrier was liquidated in 2004.

Seriously, the action of the affected banks calls for a serious review by the CBN as this is just one of the many unprofessional conducts of the banks in Nigeria which cannot be tolerated elsewhere.

Many of the banks prior to now, perhaps, out of their zeal to remain in business had engaged in questionable conducts without recourse to the subsequent implications of such acts on their customers talk less of their own image. These unprofessional attitudes have scared many people away from many banks.

With the latest attitude displayed by the eight banks towards the government and the former Airways workers, the time has come for the CBN to beam its searchlight on the commercial banks.

While Crucial Moment is telling them not to look for how to remain in business, such efforts should not compromise integrity, fairness and professionalism.

The affected banks should be sanctioned and such sanctions should include asking them to pay a certain percentage as interest on the money they withheld which they must have used to trade while the drama lasted.