How we bought N4bn NECOM House –Bankole
By BISI OLALEYE
Friday, June 03, 2011


Against the controversy surrounding the sale of Nitels 37 storey building, popularly called NECOM House on Marina, Lagos, Mr. Biola Bankole, one of the directors of West African Aluminum Products Plc , the new owner of the building has said that contrary to allegations of secrecy in the deal that the house was transparently and lawfully bought.

In an exclusively interview with Daily Sun on Wednesday in Lagos, Bankole said that the sale of NECOM House actually started in March 2007 and that it was number one on the list of about 800 to 850 properties advertised for sale by the liquidator. He narrated that WAPP Plc saw the advertisement in the papers and made enquiries on who the Liquidator was, and discovered that it was Otunba Olusola Adekanola .

“We met him and we not only found out that he was the authorized liquidator to dispose of all properties advertised in the Punch and his appointment was validated by a court order. We prepared and submitted our bids and the Liquidator rightly contacted us as the highest bidder, all this was between 2007 and 2008, one year apart. Payment was made in 2007 and we perfected all title documents in 2009.

“Thereafter, we took possession of the building, the parking space and the inventory of what was in the building. We wrote a letter to Nitel that has some equipment in the building to come and pay rents to us as the new owners. That was when all these problems started. If it was controversial, where were they when the property was advertised in 2007? Where were they when we paid for the property in 2008? Where were they when we perfected our title document in 2009? And we took possession of the property, all this while no one was talking about transparency or accused us of anything, only for someone to come after four years and accuse us of buying Nitel property in secrecy,” Bankole said.

Bankole also stressed that only mischievous people would allege that the building was worth N75 billion. “We read in the papers that the value of Nitel house was supposed to be N75 billion, unfortunately I do not know where Nitel personnel or staff got that information from. You will agree with me that Nigeria has been trying to sell Nitel at different times but failed. This is because an investor would not like a situation whereby after buying someone somewhere would emerge to say that the sale was not valid enough or due diligence was not followed. I think that this is not good enough for the country’s corporate image.”

He averred that the NECOM building was well valued at N4.5 billion by a recognized and reputable chartered estate surveyor and valuer in the person of M.I Okoro and Associate, noting that WAPP has been silent because it has not done anything wrong and everything done was lawful and correct. He added that the controversy over the sale actually started when the company wrote to the occupants of the building to pay rents.
http://sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2011/june/03/national-03-06-2011-002.html