Court modifies interim forfeiture order on accounts without BVN

The Abuja Division of the Federal High Court on Wednesday modified its order directing 19 commercial banks in the country to freeze all accounts without Bank Verification Number.
Justice Nnamdi Dimgba modified part of the order he granted on October 17 giving the Federal Government interim ownership of funds in all the non-BVN linked bank accounts.
The new position was sequel to an agreement reached by the Federal Government with the 19 commercial banks.
Dimgba said he was minded to “revise” the earlier orders in view of the fact that it had been posing some “practical problems”.
The court directed banks to immediately unfreeze accounts that had since been linked to a BVN after the orders were made on October 17 following an ex-parte motion that was filed by the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN).
The court further revoked an aspect of the order which had directed an interim forfeiture of the proceeds in all the accounts without BVN pending the determination of the substantive suit.
Dimgba said before the modification of the order on Wednesday, unfreezing the accounts without BVN even with the account owners visiting the banks to undertake the BVN registration would have amounted to a violation of one of the orders of the court since the ruling did not make BVN registration a pre-condition for unfreezing such accounts.
He said with the way the order was couched, the freezing order placed on such accounts would have subsisted until the case was finally determined and not by the account owner undertaking the BVN registration.
Dimgba said that aspect of his ruling had created “awkward and unfortunate result”.
He said: “Court engaged with all counsel to understand the practical problems posed by the Order of October 17, 2017, to the extent that it provides in Relief 4, ‘An interim order of the honourable court freezing the said accounts by stopping all outward payments, operations or transactions (including any bill of exchange) in respect of the accounts pending the hearing and determination of the substantive application’.
“It was generally agreed that this relief as currently couched creates an awkward and unfortunate result such that even when parties have gone to the banks to undertake their BVN, they still will not be able to operate the accounts because doing so will be in violation of the order of court.
“Parties agreed that the said Order No 4 should be revised to eliminate this problem, in the interim.
“Having listened to all counsel on record, and with the consent of all parties represented, I hereby revise Relief 4 of the court’s order of October 17, 2017 such that the new Relief 4 shall be: ‘An interim order of the honourable court stopping all outward payments, operations or outward transactions (including any bill of exchange) in respect of the accounts pending the linking of the accounts to a Bank Verification Number’.
“In view of the above agreed compromise revision of Relief 4, I also hereby revoke and set aside Relief 5 of the court’s order of October 17, 2017, which provides for: ‘An interim order of forfeiture of the monies in the said accounts without BVN to the Claimants/Applicants being accounts with insufficient Know Your Customer guidelines contrary to Section 3 of the Money Laundering Act, 2011 and CBN guidelines the determination of the originating motion on notice.’”