Etisalat Nigeria Taken Over By Access Bank And Other Banks

A consortium of lenders led by Access Bank Nigeria has taken over Etisalat Nigeria with effect from June 15^th after talks to restructure the payment of their loan debt of $1.72 billion (about ₦541 billion) hit a wall.

Etisalat Nigeria had obtained loans from 13 banks which included Access Bank, UBA, Zenith Bank, Guaranty Bank and others, in the year 2013 in a bid to enhance their network rollout across the country.

The takeover was announced on Tuesday by the parent company, Etisalat Group.

Meanwhile, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) along with the Nigeria

Communications Commission (NCC) failed in their attempt to convince the banks against the takeover as their effort did not yield a favorable result.

Also, Ibrahim Dikko, the Vice president, Regulatory and Corporate Affairs of Etisalat responded in confirmation of the claim stating that other options were discussed with the consortium of lenders as regards to the management of the company as well as giving favorable response to the 23 million subscribers on the Etisalat network

.

He said: “Discussions are ongoing regarding other issues such as the trading name during this transition phase. Operations and services to our subscribers remain normal and will in no way be affected as we continue to deliver quality services to our subscribers.”

He continued by saying: “We will continue to tap into the rich, creative and innovative resources within our workforce to build a stronger business upon the stable foundation we have laid in our nine years of operations.”