As Britain’s Commonwealth Development Corporation plans to exit DFCU Bank, Eagle Online understands top managers at the bank are to hold a crisis meeting with the Bank of Uganda Director of supervision Dr .Tumubweine Twinemanzi this afternoon.
On Saturday the top managers met Deputy Governor of BOU Dr. Louis Kasekende in an effort to help them stream their operations as some major shareholders plan to exit.
An insider with the bank intimated to Eagle Online that managers want BOU to give them a clean sheet of operation, with the anticipation to attract more investors.
That came following the resignation of Arise B.V.’s Deepak Malik from the bank’s board of directors. Malik is the executive director of Arise B.V. which has majority shares in DFCU Bank.
Arise B.V.acquired a 55 per cent majority stake in dfcu Limited, the holding company of DFCU Bank after lending US $50 million in February 2017 to the bank to help it meet short-term capitalisation needs after it controversially took over Crane Bank in January 2017.
New details also indicate that the top shareholders in the bank are fighting over profits made in 2017. Insiders say some shareholders are not happy that Arise B.V. which only came in February 2017 is to take most of the profits.
Arise B.V. came in DFCU Bank after acquiring shares formally belonging to two previous largest shareholders, Bank-Rabo Development B.V and Norfinance AS (Norfund) which had a 27.54 per cent stake each.
After controversially acquiring Crane Bank in January 2017, DFCU Bank would by end of December announce net profit of Shs127.6 billion, which was Shs81 billion higher, considering that it recorded a profit of Shs46 billion at end of December 2016.
Other sources that have talked to Eagle Online say some of the UK-based shareholders are dissatisfied and want to sue top managers over a number of concerns.
According to Irina Grigorenko-CDC’s investment director, the company wants to exit DFCU though she said in a letter that no transaction has yet been approved by its investment committee. “Any decision by CDC to sell its shares in DFCU would be subject to the approval of the investment committee of the terms of the sale as well as the agreement of legal documentation,” she said.
Grigorenko pointed out two of the potential investors as Cranemere Africa Limited and responsAbility Investments AG (the Strategic Investors).
However, it remains to be seen whether the two companies can take over shares of CDC given the current state of affairs at DFCU Bank.