Secret Reporters No place to hide
Secret Reporters
Asides the numerous illegal deductions and withholding of millions of customer’s money without reversal, First Bank has been called out for their gross negligence and misconduct. It was alleged that the bank whose mantra is “You First” has refused to prioritize the interest of their clientele but rather expose them to jeopardy due to their act of unprofessionalism.
In a recent tweet by a civil rights activist and an active Twitter user with the handle @segalink, it was alleged that the bank is infamous for its several corporate crimes one of which is the criminal conversion of property kept in the provided bank lockers by the bank’s security officer and collusion between the First Bank of Nigeria and its security guards.
According to the tweets, it was alleged that one Mr. John Wine Wilcox who was invited to Nigeria on an online editing project visited one of the branches of “fraud bank” in Isheri to carry out some transactions, on entry into the bank, he was directed to drop his personal belongings which included a backpack containing his MacBook laptop, hard drives, phone and other important documents in security locker provided by the bank. The gentleman complied and proceeded into the banking hall with a key to the locker provided by the bank security guard.
However, when he returned after the transaction, he was greeted with the shock of his life as his belongings were nowhere to be found with the locker ajar. An immediate complaint to the bank led two FBN staff; Mrs Tosin Oyeseay and Ede Okoanegbete to inspect the said lockers and surprisingly it was discovered that the key to the locker could actually open all other lockers as none were unique.
In order to manage the situation, he immediately reported to the Police and petitioned the bank manager which led to the arrest of the guard and the bank agreeing to their liability and promised that the insurance firm will pay for the damages.
In a bid to attain social justice after waiting for several months without any positive response from the bank, the victim contacted a non-profit organization known as Gavel who wrote to the Central Bank of Nigeria, CPC, and the Lagos State Commissioner of Police on behalf of the victim. The organization also allowed the engagement of another firm to double the efforts of the petition, yet no tangible feedback was gotten. Information gathered by this online news medium further revealed that the only response gotten was a lame letter from the bank promising to manage the situation without actually doing anything about it, thereby leaving the young man to the mercy of his angry and disappointed clients to suffer psychological torture.
Despite the hurdles presented over 7 months of the occurrence of the unfortunate incident, it was purported that the bank has done nothing to help the victim recover from the great loss but rather, the supposed insurance that is meant to help pay for the losses is trying to shelve liability as they kept managing him with false hope, bouncing him from the Bank manager to the Insurance manager and CBN liaison officer.
SecretReporters also gathered that as a result of this, the victim has been receiving life-threatening messages from clients who feel he made away with their money and failed to deliver their work as promised.
Furthermore, the nonprofit organization alleged that there might be a criminal conspiracy by FBN as they not only failed to provide the CCTV footage as evidence but also hurriedly changed their storage locks and dysfunctional Surveillance system. In that regards, the organization has made a resolution to host the largest customer nationwide protest across all the branches of First Bank on behalf of Mr John whose life was almost ruined by the gross negligence of the bank, the criminal deceit of the bank’s insurance company and the indolence of Central Bank.
