August 18, (THEWILL) – Recently, a Federal High Court in Abuja denied a motion by the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) seeking an order to compel 12 banks and some financial institutions to reverse billions of naira allegedly, fraudulently withdrawn from a Flutterwave account at Wema Bank. The withdrawals reportedly occurred due to a system glitch between October 12 and 13, 2023. In the motion ex parte, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1015/24 and dated July 17, 2024, the IGP’s legal team argued that about 244 suspects criminally siphoned billions from Flutterwave’s account, transferring the funds to numerous bank accounts belonging to individuals who are either untraceable or difficult to locate.
The court however declined to grant the ex parte motion, emphasizing the need for the banks to be heard and noting the applicant’s failure to file a motion on notice alongside it. Recall that a few months ago, THEWILL had reported that Flutterwave allegedly lost N11 billion due to the security breach. However, the company denied this insisting that the breach was unsuccessful. Flutterwave confirmed that the incident occurred in April when it detected unusual activities on one of its platforms, used by a small number of customers for specific business transactions. The company stated that it immediately informed law enforcement agencies and provided the IP address and details of the offenders. However, despite their denial, court documents later revealed that the company had sought police assistance to recover the stolen funds. Preliminary investigations by the police showed that fraudulent transactions were carried out by 814 Point Of Sales, POS agents using Flutterwave POS terminals on October 12 and 13, 2023 during the system glitch. During proceedings last week, the IGP’s counsel, urged the presiding judge to grant his motion ex parte, in accordance with relevant laws, and order the reversal of funds to Flutterwave.
However, the judge challenged the IGP’s counsel to justify why the ex parte motion should be granted without hearing from the respondents in line with the constitutional provisions of fair hearing. He subsequently refused the ex parte motion, describing it as a clear breach of Section 36 of the 1999 Constitution, which guarantees the right to a fair hearing. The case is now pending.
