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By Camillus Eboh and Chijioke Ohuocha
ABUJA, April 29 (Reuters) - Nigeria's central bank on
Thursday sacked the entire board of First Bank of Nigeria and
appointed new directors, the regulator said in a statement,
citing the previous board's "sweeping changes" without alerting
regulatory authorities.
First Bank of Nigeria (FBN) did not respond to calls seeking
comment.
The bank had been in "grave financial condition" when the
regulator become involved in its management "to maintain
financial stability" in 2016, giving it authority over FBN's
operations, the central bank said.
The sacking of the board on Thursday was done "in order to
preserve stability of the bank, so as to protect minority
shareholders and depositors," said the regulator.
"The actions being taken are meant to strengthen the bank
and position it as a banking industry giant," it said.
Nigeria's central bank has powers to remove bank executives
and used them during the 2008/2009 global financial crisis when
it sacked nine CEOs at banks that were under-capitalised.
The regulator in 2016 sacked top executives of Skye Bank
over capital adequacy issues, having in 2015 given three
commercial banks time to recapitalise after they failed to hit a
minimum capital adequacy rate of 10%.