The Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) has described the remarks made by former Director General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), Dr. Ndidi Okereke-Onyuike, that the commission be merged with the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) because the institutions have a common mandate as unfortunate.

The Commission said that Dr Okereke-Onyuike’s remarks showed she “clearly lacked adequate understanding of the roles of the NDIC in the Nigerian financial system, which had been widely acknowledged over the last 27 years.”

In a statement signed by the NDIC management, the Commission said that contrary to Okereke-Onyuike’s assertion, “the NDIC does not enjoy any government subventions. Its income is derived from investment of insurance premium paid by the insured banks. In fact, the Corporation has been remitting billions of Naira of its annual operating surpluses to the Federal Government as required by the Fiscal Responsibility Act.”

NDIC further reminded the former DG that the objectives of the corporation which was established in 1988 and commenced operations in 1989 to administer Deposit Insurance System (DIS) in the country “include Protection of Depositors, particularly small savers by providing an orderly means of reimbursement in the event of failure of an insured banking institution. The core mandates of NDIC include Deposit Guarantee, Bank Supervision, Failure Resolution and Bank Liquidation.”

The Commission also stated that “It is on record that the Corporation in collaboration with the CBN in 2009 midwifed the establishment of Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON). AMCON was purposely set up to purchase toxic assets from the banking institutions and engage in debt recovery of such non-performing loans.”

Okereke-Onwyuike stirred the hornet’s nest when she called on the federal government to merge the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) with Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) as their mandates were similar during her speech at a book launch in Lagos.

 “The failure resolution mandate of the Corporation allows it to extend Technical and Financial Assistance to eligible banks, assist in Purchase and Assumption (P&A) transactions, Deposit Transfer, Merger and Acquisition (M&A), Bridge Bank as done in 2011 in collaboration with the CBN to prevent monumental banking crisis in Nigeria and outright liquidation of failed institutions. It is also worth mentioning that through the bridge bank initiative, over three (3) million depositors and 6,600 jobs were saved.

“The NDIC’s mandate and scope of operations are far beyond such narrow scope as was ignorantly painted by Mrs. Okereke-Onyuike. Hence, the call for the merger of the NDIC and AMCON is misplaced and totally uncalled for,” the corporation added.