Senior officials of the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday told a legislative hearing that their director general Arunma Oteh arbitrarily run the affairs of the commission since she came in two years ago.Executive commissioners and other staff who testified at the resumed hearing in Abuja on the 'near-collapse' of the capital market said Oteh routinely disregarded the due process.They made the allegations after the committee, headed by Rep. Ibrahim Tukur El-Sudi, sought to know whether critical decisions by SEC in the wake of the banking crisis were taken by the board and management of the commission.The commissioners and directors who spoke said Oteh took her decisions alone and never consulted them.Human resources director Husseini Dauda said his office was not consulted in the appointment of two Access Bank staff on secondment to SEC and another 10 'young professionals' as special assistants. He said those appointments were done without the approval of the management and board.Dauda said Oteh also ignored advice from executive commissioner in charge of legal and enforcement, Charles Udora, and the audit control unit.When asked if Dauda's claims were correct, the commissioners as well as secretary to the commission Mr. Aigbekhan Idahosa distanced themselves from the contentious appointments.Committee members said it was wrong for SEC as capital market regulator to rely on a listed bank for manpower. But Oteh insisted that there was no conflict of interest because the commission had put in mechanism to check that.Lawmakers also sought to know how SEC arrived at the decision to organise 'Project 50' to celebrate 50 years of capital market operations which gulped about N1 billion.Oteh said the decision was taken by the executive management, but executive commissioner in charge of finance, Malam Sani Stores, and other commissioners said they were not aware of that decision. Stores said because he was not a member of the committee that planned the event, he had no records of donations received.Oteh had told the committee that she came up with a document on 'Road Map for a World Class Capital Market' in consultation with the management team, but the executive commissioner for operations, Mrs. Ena Esekine, who said she has worked for 30 years at SEC, distanced herself from the document.Stores also said, 'I have been in SEC since 1993 but I have never been involved or seen the document.''There is dysfunction in the commission in the sense that we don't meet; we only receive text messages and emails. There are no scheduled meetings. She brought people who are occupying positions they are not qualified to,' said Udora.Stores added: 'There is no collective decision and trust; certain decisions are taken that we are not aware of. It's done unilaterally and we can't access her.' Aigbekhan said there were no structured meetings in SEC.House committee members said Oteh ignored a caution later from the Bureau for Public Procurement on the expenditure of N42 million on hotel accommodation during the 'Project 50' celebrations.The committee sought to know why SEC under Oteh gave approval for the acquisition of Intercontinental Bank by Access Bank at a time when the managing director and deputy managing director of Access Bank were owing Intercontinental Bank N16 billion. Oteh said she would investigate the matter.The executive commissioners further blamed Oteh over the nationalisation of Union Bank. Udora said he had advised the DG that it was inappropriate for the Asset Management Corporation of Nigerian (AMCON) to take up the losses of N8 billion incurred by Union Bank. 'I personally feel somebody should account for the money. My observations were communicated to the DG through the appropriate channel,' he said.SEC commissioners said they used to work as a team during the tenures of Musa Alfaki and Suleiman Ndanusa but lamented that this was 'really lacking in the organisation now.'Earlier at the beginning of the hearing, Oteh apologised to the committee over her failure to attend to the hearing on Tuesday which caused the committee threaten her arrest.The investigative hearings continue on Tuesday.
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