Lotus Bank Staff Pulls Off ₦1.5B Cyber-Fraud
An internal review by Lotus Bank conducted between January 2023 and February 2026 uncovered a major fraud scheme linked to staff member Abdulkarim Arome Mohammed, according to a Federal High Court affidavit sworn by bank fraud investigator Sunday Gbadebo in Lagos, with proceedings now adjourned until June 16, 2026.
Lotus Bank has accused Abdulkarim Arome Mohammed, a staff member in its Financial Control Department, of abusing his system access to orchestrate a massive fraud. According to the bank, Mohammed manipulated the system to illicitly divert ₦1,552,130,998.85 in customer-owned Mudarabah profits into several unauthorized accounts.
The lender discovered the scheme after detecting suspicious profit payments during a comprehensive internal review spanning January 2023 to May 2024. Once siphoned, the stolen funds were rapidly spread and dissipated into various accounts held across 22 different financial institutions and three individuals.
“Mudarabah deposits are defined as the net average balance for all types of Mudarabah deposits (savings or term deposits) standing in the bank’s books at the end of the month,” it said.
The lender added that the beneficiary accounts belonged to Mohammed’s wife, Khadijah Aliyu Shuaib, identified as a FINCO officer responsible for advising on profit distribution, as well as one Peter Daniel and Emmas Ocheja Odogwu.
The incident, which occurred in May 2024, has continued to linger as more defendants are being added to the case in a bid by the bank to recover the said sum allegedly diverted fraudulently, with the latest defendant added in February 2026.
Damilola Kusimo, of Lotus Bank’s Brand, Marketing and Communications department, had not responded to inquiries at the time of publication.
