The Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) has announced plans to begin payments to depositors of the defunct Heritage Bank who had deposits exceeding N5 million.
This was disclosed by the NDIC’s Managing Director, Bello Hassan, during the 2024 workshop for the Financial Correspondents Association of Nigeria (FICAN) in Lagos on Thursday.
According to Hassan, the NDIC is working to ensure depositors with balances above N5 million are compensated through liquidation dividends.
The Corporation has also initiated efforts to recover debts in order to facilitate these payments.
“We are making a concerted effort to cover the assets in terms of physical assets and debts in liquidation dividends which have already commenced,” Hassan said.
Regarding the payment of insured deposits, Hassan revealed that most insured depositors of Heritage Bank have already been paid.
However, there are still some outstanding payments for depositors who have not provided alternate accounts or whose accounts are subject to legal or regulatory restrictions.
“The only group of insured depositors that we have not paid are those with no alternate account and have not come forward to provide an alternate account so that we can pay them,” Hassan explained.
He added that depositors with accounts frozen by court orders or regulatory agencies due to fraud or Know-Your-Customer (KYC) issues will be paid once these orders are lifted.
News About Nigeria reported that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had revoked Heritage Bank’s licence on June 3, 2024, citing the bank’s inability to improve its financial performance and posing a threat to financial stability.
The CBN explained that the revocation was necessary after various supervisory measures failed to reverse the bank’s decline.
In a statement issued on June 4, 2024, NDIC confirmed that depositors would be paid up to N5 million, while those with larger amounts would receive liquidation dividends after the bank’s assets were realised and debts recovered.
The NDIC has urged depositors without alternate bank accounts to visit the nearest branch of the defunct bank or file an online claim for verification and payment of their insured sums.
