Muibat Olayemi, a Lagos coconut trader, has accused First Bank of negligence resulting in the loss of the N900,000 in her account to unknown persons.

Jamiu Olayemi, Muibat’s son, told FIJ that a man approached his mother as an Airtel service agent on October 10, asking for her phone in order to determine whether her National Identity Number (NIN) was linked to her phone number. 

The next day, Muibat visited the First Bank branch in Abule Egba and realised that N190,000 had been deducted from her bank account. 

“A man came to my mother’s shop claiming to work with Airtel. He asked my mother for her phone and said he wanted to do something about her NIN. My mom had been having issues with her phone. She could make calls but couldn’t receive calls. So, she innocently gave the man her phone. This was on October 10. I don’t know what he did to the phone, but my mother found out that about N190,000 had been deducted from her bank account when she went there the following day,” Jamiu told FIJ on Friday. 

“My mom called to notify me of her missing money. I advised her to tell her bank to block the account, which was done. The next day, which was October 12, I went to the bank to confirm how the money left my mother’s account. They told us that the money left the bank account via USSD. I asked for a statement of account and the bank officials told me to write to the bank to unblock the bank account. 

“I wrote to the bank and got the account statement. The statement showed that the money left her account in N20,000 recharge bits and N10,000 transfers to a few other bank accounts. When I saw this, I asked the bank for an investigation into the accounts the stolen money went into.”

Jamiu told FIJ that he told the bank that he wanted no one else to have access to his mother’s bank account and suggested the bank deactivate the USSD and internet banking services on the account.

“I told them that the account should be locked and only my mother should be able to make withdrawals at the bank. So, I was surprised when my mom called me to tell me that her remaining funds had been deducted from the same account. This was on October 18.

“This was a bank account that was supposed to be under investigation. I didn’t know why they did not disable the USSD after I told them to block the account. When I saw the account statement on October 18, I noticed that the money was deducted in N20,000 and N10,000 bits.”