{"id":59667,"date":"2025-01-16T18:59:42","date_gmt":"2025-01-16T18:59:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=59667"},"modified":"2025-01-16T18:59:42","modified_gmt":"2025-01-16T18:59:42","slug":"court-seizes-obaigbenas-oil-vessel-over-225-8m-debt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/01\/16\/court-seizes-obaigbenas-oil-vessel-over-225-8m-debt\/","title":{"rendered":"Court Seizes Obaigbena\u2019s Oil Vessel Over $225.8M Debt"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Ade Iyamoye<\/strong><\/p>\n

A Federal High Court in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, has ordered the seizure of an oil vessel belonging to General Hydrocarbons Limited (GHL), a company owned by Nduka Obaigbena, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief of ThisDay Media Group and Arise Group.<\/p>\n

The order follows a debt recovery suit filed by First Bank of Nigeria (FBN), which claims GHL owes $225.8 million as of September 30, 2024.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit, marked FHC\/PH\/CS\/02\/2025, names First Bank as the plaintiff, while General Hydrocarbons Ltd, the Cargo of Crude Oil on Board FPSO Tamara Tokoni, the vessel\u2019s owners\/operators, and its master are the first to fourth defendants.<\/p>\n

Presiding over the case, Justice E.A. Obile issued an order mandating the immediate arrest and detention of the crude oil cargo aboard the Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO), vessel, Tamara Tokoni.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is therefore to require and order you forthwith to arrest and detain the cargo of crude oil on board the floating production storage and offloading (FPSO), vessel Tamara Tokoni and to keep same under detention until you shall receive further order(s) from the Court,\u201d Justice Obile ruled.<\/p>\n

However, no specific law enforcement agency was tasked with executing the seizure.<\/p>\n

The case is the latest in the legal battle between First Bank and Obaigbena\u2019s General Hydrocarbons Ltd over unpaid credit facilities.<\/p>\n

In a separate suit, FHC\/L\/CS\/2378\/2024, Justice Deinde Dipeolu of the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court ordered Nigerian banks to blacklist Obaigbena and his family members over their alleged indebtedness to First Bank.<\/p>\n

The ruling also restricted Obaigbena from transferring any assets linked to him outside the court\u2019s jurisdiction.<\/p>\n

First Bank had earlier alleged that Obaigbena\u2019s oil servicing firm, General Hydrocarbons, assumed debts amounting to $718 million, involving his family members Efe Damilola Obaigbena and Olabisi Eka Obaigbena.<\/p>\n

This latest court order reinforces First Bank\u2019s efforts to recover the outstanding debt, adding further legal and financial pressure on Obaigbena\u2019s embattled oil firm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ade Iyamoye A Federal High Court in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, has ordered the seizure of an oil vessel belonging to General Hydrocarbons Limited (GHL), a company owned by Nduka Obaigbena, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief of ThisDay Media Group and Arise Group. The order follows a debt recovery suit filed by First Bank of Nigeria […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":59668,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59667"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59669,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59667\/revisions\/59669"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}