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His Lordship, Hon. Justice K. D. Damulak of the National Industrial Court of Nigeria, Sokoto Judicial Division on Wednesday 25th April in a judgment declared the termination of the employment of the ONYILO WILLIAMS EJEMBI (claimant) by ECO BANK NIGERIA PLC (Defendant) is in line with the term of his contract of employment and also ordered that claimant is entitled to be paid his salaries for the period of his suspension from 12th April 2013 to 7th January, 2014 totalling the sum of N 2,834,567.12
By a form of complaint dated 10/10/2016, the claimant claims against the defendant among others; A DECLARATION that the termination of appointment of the Claimant from the services of the Defendant as an officer via the Defendant’s Notice of termination of appointment dated 7th January, 2014 was wrongful, null and void and of no effect whatsoever. AN ORDER that the Defendant pay the salaries of the Claimant from the 11th April 2013 till date and AN ORDER directing the Defendant to pay the sum of N2,119,545.26 (Two Million, One Hundred and Nineteen Thousand, Five Hundred and Forty Five Naira, Twenty Six Kobo) being his one month salary in lieu of notice of termination, severance pay and total benefit as contained in the notice of termination dated 7th January, 2014.
The claimant’s case is that he was a staff of the ECO BANK NIGERIA PLC at its Argungu branch, Kebbi State until 7/1/2014. After the merger of Oceanic Bank International Plc with the defendant, his grade was harmonized to Band M, Banking officer until his termination in January 2014. That sometimes in 2013 the manager of Total Filling Station Argungu called him to complain that some deposits were not credited to its account. He confirmed after checking that only N36, 000 was credited to the account of Total Filling Station. The filling station wrote a petition against him for not crediting its account with the sum of N9,000,000 (Nine Million Naira).That he was never given the said amount by Total Filling Station to deposit. That the internal investigation of the defendant did not find anything indicting him as being responsible for not crediting the said account. That the defendant never set up a panel to investigate him upon being issued a query contrary to the standard procedure of the Bank.
That the defendant reported him to the police who investigated the case and issued a report exonerating him. Not satisfied, the defendant instructed the police to prosecute him at the Magistrate court Kebbi State but the case was later abandoned by both the police and the defendant.
By the defendant’s letter dated 11/4/2013 he was suspended indefinitely without pay based on the allegation of the said Total Filling Station and was to be reporting daily to the officer and he was so reporting until on 7/1/2014 when his contract was terminated by a letter in which he was offered one month salary in lieu of notice and a total benefit calculated to be N2,119,454.26K which sum was never paid to him despite the fact that his employment was wrongfully terminated.
The defendant’s counsel on his part submitted that the termination of the claimant’s employment by the defendant was not wrongful and so the claimant is not entitled to any of his claim.
After reviewing the argument of the parties, the Court Presided by Hon. Justice K. D. Damulak expressed thus;
“From the above, it is clear that the termination of the claimant’s appointment was in line with the terms of his employment as contained on page 2 of his letter of appointment. The letter of termination did not state that it was based on any wrong committed by the claimant but simply that his services were no longer required and the termination was stated to be in line with the terms of your contract of employment with the Bank, the Bank is hereby exercising its right to determine the contract.
I find that the termination of the employment of the claimant is in line with the term of his contract of employment, it is not wrongful, it is valid and it stands.
From the above, it is clear that the claimant was entitled to a net benefit of N2,119,545.26 which is the first alternative claim of the claimant. There is no reason why the defendant should not be made to pay this sum to the claimant except if it has already done so.
It is also clear from the termination letter, exhibit CW1D, that the claimant’s salary for the period of his suspension was not included in the calculation. This is equivalent to terminating the claimant’s employment with effect from the date of his suspension.
I accordingly find that the claimant is entitled to be paid his salaries for the period of his suspension from 12th April 2013 to 7th January, 2014.I so hold.
The claimant’s prayer in paragraph 24(k) for the sum of N 2,834,567.12 being 8 months’ salary covering the period of his suspension succeeds and is hereby granted.
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