The bank is also expected to pay GH¢100,000 as litigation cost
The Accra High Court, Commercial Division 6, has reportedly ordered First Atlantic Bank to pay over GH¢10 million to one of its customers for tendering his bonds for the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP) without his consent.
According to a report by thelawplaform.com, approximately GH¢28.4 million of the money to be paid to the customer is for the loss suffered by the customer from the bank tendering his bonds for the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme without his consent.
While GH¢2 million was awarded as exemplary damages to the customer, who was the plaintiff in the case titled VIHAMA ENERGY COMPANY LTD & ANOR v. FIRST ATLANTIC BANK [TLP-HC-2025-06].
Additionally, the court ordered the bank to pay GH¢100,000 as litigation cost to the plaintiff.
The report indicated that the presiding judge, Justice Sedina Agbamava, threw out the defence of the bank that it was coerced by regulators to tender the bonds for the DDEP.
“The Court, in its judgment delivered on the 12th day of December, 2025, available on the Case Report of The Law Platform Library, held that the bank acted negligently and failed to safeguard the investment the customer had entrusted to the bank.
“The court held at page 11 of the judgment that ‘The Defendant’s unilateral decision to tender the bonds without the consent of the owner was a fundamental breach of its mandate and fiduciary trust, as no such discretion was warranted by the facility agreement or any other instrument’,” part of the report read.
Below is a brief of the case shared in the report:
The Plaintiffs, Vihama Energy and Sebastian Asem, acquired a loan facility from the Defendant Bank, which facility was secured by Government of Ghana Bonds (GOG-26) and ESLA Bonds (ESLA-31), duly lodged with the Defendant as collateral. Per the claims of the Plaintiffs, as upheld by the Court, at no material time did the Plaintiffs execute any documentation or give any consent authorising the tender of the said bonds into the Government’s Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP).
Notwithstanding the absence of consent, the Defendant unilaterally and unlawfully tendered the Plaintiffs’ bonds into the DDEP, purporting to do so in the interest of the Defendant Bank. The Defendant sought to justify its conduct on the basis that the Plaintiffs had allegedly defaulted in repayment of the facility and that the bonds were at risk of becoming worthless if not tendered.
Her Ladyship Agbamava J. found no evidence for the claims of the Bank, which were contained in its over 100-paragraphed Statement of Defence. The Court found that the Plaintiffs duly discharged all their obligations under the loan facility, and subsequent events confirmed that the bonds retained their full value.
The Court, through the evidence of the witness of the Bank, found that after the commencement of the suit, the bonds were eventually restored to their original state and that, during the period in which the bonds were wrongfully lodged under the DDEP, the Plaintiffs did not receive all coupon payments to which they were lawfully entitled. Thus, the order for the payment of an amount of over GH¢8.43 million to the 2nd Plaintiff, together with hefty damages, was to serve as a firm “disapproval of a party’s [bank’s] egregious conduct.”
BAI
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