Kola Abiola’s Myriad of Troubles
All over the world, news abound of children of stupendously rich men and women who could not successfully build on the business empires established by their late parents.
In recent time, there have been tales of how Kola Abiola, son of the late business mogul, publisher and politician, Chief MKO Abiola, has come to swell up the number of children whose parents were in history adjudged as wealthy but have failed to carry on the legacy.
Before his late father ran for President in 1993, he was arguably the wealthiest man in Nigeria.
He had his hand in many pies, including banking, finance and education, transport, publishingand oil and gas.
But Kola, the eldest son of the acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 election, seems to be finding it hard to preserve the family wealth.
While many expect that he would have taken the octopod business to the next level, he has beenbogged down with inheritance tussle with some of his siblings as well as contending with issues of heavy debt burden concerning his own personal investments.For some years now, Kola’s name has consistently found its way into the exclusive list ofnon-performing loan debtors.
Not quite long, he lost the oil bloc (OPL 206) for Summit Oil International.
Under his watch, the company simply lost its glitter and became unattractive. He reportedly turnedIt into gainless venture. As a result , the Federal Government wielded the big hammer on thecompany revoking its licence. Kola’s trajectory again became manifest, since news filtered in that he has been running from pillar to post to keep to the terms of settlement filed beforethe Federal High Court, Ikoyi, Lagos, by Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria, AMCON over a N1.8 billion debt owed by one of his own personal companies, 35 Oil and Gas Nigeria Limited.
The Court had ruled in June over an AMCON application filedand argued before it granted an order directing 19 commercial banks in Nigeria named in the application to freeze the accounts of the defendants to the sum of N1,891,532,469.21 pending the final determination of the suit.
