To forestall a repeat of what transpired at Transnational Corporation Plc where he was caught napping as billionaire businessman, Femi Otedola attempt
To forestall a repeat of what transpired at Transnational Corporation Plc where he was caught napping as billionaire businessman, Femi Otedola attempted to take over the indigenous conglomerate, Tony Elumelu has now tightened his grip on United Bank of Africa, UBA which he chairs.
The economist and banker has increased his shareholding in the bank by buying 70 million units of the bank’s shares via his private equity firm, HH Capital.
According to the details of the deal, HH Capital Limited acquired 70,000,000 shares of UBA at N8 per unit on the floor of the NGX.
The deal is worth N560m.
This was disclosed in a corporate filing on the Nigerian Exchange Limited on Wednesday.
In its 2022 audited financial statements, Elumelu holds directly 194,669,555 units of UBA shares and 2,185,934,184 indirectly through HH Capital Limited (140,843,816), Heirs Holdings Limited (1,814,003,900 ) and Heirs Alliance Limited (231,086,468 units).
Otedola recently accused him of backstabbing him in some deals dating back to 2008.
These accusations came to light following the rejection of Otedola’s offer to buy Transcorp for N250 billion.
“In 2005, while Tony was the Managing Director of Standard Trust Bank, he approached me to get funds to acquire UBA. I enthusiastically gave him $20m, which was N2bn at that time to buy the necessary shares in UBA for the acquisition.
“After a short period of time, the share price moved up and I decided it was a good moment to sell and get out of the bank. However, Tony appealed to me to hold on to the shares as he was convinced that there were future prospects – so I kept the shares,” Otedola had revealed.
“I became chairman of Transcorp Hotel in 2007 with a shareholding of five per cent and unknowingly, Tony gradually started buying shares quietly.
“By the following year in 2008, I went bankrupt in Nigeria. Tony proceeded to take my shares in UBA to service the interest on my loans and he also took over my shares in Africa Finance Corporation, where I was the largest shareholder,” he continued.
“Shortly after, Albert Okumagba informed me that an American firm wanted to acquire my shares in Transcorp, which I then agreed to sell. However, this supposed American firm turned out to be Tony Elumelu. The revelation of this prompted me to resign as chairman of the hotel.
“Years later in 2012, Tony said he wanted to see me so we met in my office where I had previously had a meeting with foreign investors who had not yet departed the premises.
“Curious to know, he asked what sort of meeting I had had and I disclosed that I wanted to go into the power business, specifically Ughelli Power Plant. Tony quietly went ahead to bid for Ughelli and he outbid me by offering to buy the plant for $300m,” he added.
