Fraud charges taint BoB, Collins Newman law firm

BoB as the regulators of the collapsed bank have emerged victorious in Justice Zein Kebonang’s recent judgment following a successful bid to rescind a default judgment granted to EBC Guernsey. The default judgment had been granted after it emerged that the attorneys from Collins Newman on behalf of their client, BoB, had failed to file an appearance to defend EBC’s writ of summons against BoB, to recover their losses after the collapse of the Kingdom Bank. Instead BoB and Collins Newman were accused of fraud through forging a court stamp.

Despite the tainted image, Kebonang said he exercised his discretion, consequently setting aside the default judgment and writ of execution issued by the Registrar on July 15, 2015 and that merits of the case and the defence could only be ascertained at a trial. However this was just a minor victory on the part of the BoB as EBC will still want to recover its losses, which had been filed in the sum of about P28 million.