The Senate at its plenary session of Tuesday, 24 October 2017 mandated its Committees on Communications, Banking, Capital Market, National Security and Intelligence to investigate the management and utilization of a $1.2billion loan granted to Etisalat Telecommunication Company by thirteen Nigerian banks.

Presenting the motion titled “The need for Senate’s intervention in the recent ETISALAT (Nigeria) $1.2 billion debt crisis”, Sen. Adeola Olamilekan (APC: Lagos) stated that Etisalat had acquired a syndicated loan in 2013, as a medium-term, seven year facility to fund the expansion of its network from thirteen Nigerian banks. However, in 2016 the Telecommunications Company defaulted on its loan obligations leading to bailouts from its Parent Company in Abu Dhabi.

According to Sen. Olamilekan, despite the bailouts, only about 42% of the loan had been repaid, while an outstanding debt of $696 million, which represents 58% of its Capital, for which the banks had resulted to take over of the telecommunications company. He explained that although the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had intervened on the basis of regulatory compliance in a bid to take over the company, the intervention failed to produce a tangible agreement on debt restructuring.

In addition to conducting investigations, the Joint Committees have been mandated to make recommendations on ways Nigeria’s financial governance structure can be strengthened by legislation to prevent any future re-occurrence on the subject matter. The Senate also urged the relevant Financial Intelligence Agencies of the Federal Government to investigate the Management of Etisalat in view of holding defaulting parties accountable for their actions.