Lekan Akinyanmi, the founder of Lekoil Ltd, Aisha Muhammed-Oyebode, a non-executive director and Gloria Iroegbunam, company secretary have tendered their resignation in the Cayman registered and London-listed affiliate of the company.
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Akinyanmi on June 2, was removed by the board of Lekoil Cayman, said to be orchestrated by Metallon Corp, a South African registered mining firm with gold mines in Zimbabwe, who holds a 15 percent majority stake in Lekoil Cayman.
Lekoil Cayman holds a 40 percent stake in Lekoil Nigeria but lacks the power to control the local board. Akinyanmi and his colleagues who resigned retain their positions on the board of Lekoil Nigeria, the company said in a release.
The resignations have been prompted by the recent behaviour and actions of the Board of Lekoil Cayman. In particular, Akinyanmi vigorously disputes his unilateral termination as CEO of Lekoil Cayman and all of the statements made by Lekoil Cayman in connection with his employment contract and the loan agreement between him and Lekoil Cayman, the company said in a release.
On her part, Muhammed-Oyebode commented: “The Board and management of Lekoil Nigeria remain committed to its vision of developing the company’s assets and we wish to assure our numerous stakeholders, especially our shareholders, partners and colleagues, that the strategic national assets under our purview will be protected by all legitimate means available to us. This in turn will ensure the restoration of value for all shareholders, both in Lekoil Nigeria and Lekoil Cayman.
“The Board of Directors of Lekoil Cayman continue to show a blatant disregard for the Shareholder Agreement, a legally binding agreement which governs the relationship between Lekoil Cayman and Lekoil Nigeria and which was implemented at the time of Lekoil Cayman’s listing to meet the requirements in Nigerian law in respect of control of indigenous strategic assets.
“The continuous breaches of due process and corporate governance by the Board of Lekoil Cayman has left us with no option but to resign collectively from the Board of Lekoil Cayman. Meanwhile, Lekoil Nigeria has separately written to Lekoil Limited’s advisers and to the AIM authorities requesting them to investigate the behaviour of the current Board of Lekoil Limited.”
