Bagyenda receives fresh summons over closure of Crane Bank, 6 others

By Mubiru Ivan

On Monday, the Parliamentary Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprise(COSASE) issued fresh summons to former Bank of Uganda Director in charge of supervision Justine Bagyenda to explain her role in the closure of seven commercial banks.

Bagyenda’s summons come at a time when Bank of Uganda top officials are under Parliamentary probe for the controversial closure of Teefe Bank (1993), International Credit Bank Ltd (1998), Greenland Bank (1999), The Co-operative Bank (1999), National Bank of Commerce (2012), Global Trust Bank (2014) and the sale of Crane Bank Ltd (CBL) to dfcu (2017) at Shs200 billion.

While meeting BoU officials led by Governor Emmanuel Mutebile yesterday, the committee agreed to summon Bagyenda after one of the witnesses pinned her and two others over the closure of the said banks.

Bagyenda and her two colleagues are accused of receiving inventory reports from the liquidator on the closure of ICB, Greenland and Co-operative Bank, but did not submit them to the governor.

According to local news website PML Daily, the committee observed that just like Teefe Bank, ICB, Greenland and Co-operative Bank were also closed without an inventory report.

BoU Director financial markets and development coordination Benard Sekabira who was the liquidator of the said banks explained that he filed the said reports and submitted them to three former BoU officials including Bagyenda, Margaret Matovu and Apollo Obo who were supposed to submit them to the governor. Mutebile revealed that indeed he never received any report as far as moving of assets from the three commercial banks during the liquidation process is concerned.

The investigation stems from the forensic audit report by the Auditor General, John Muwanga where he cited irregular operations at the Central Bank and the controversial closure and sale of the commercial banks.

“I observed that there were no guidelines/regulations or policies in place to guide the identification of the purchases of the defunct banks. There were also no guidelines to determine the procedures to be adopted by Central Bank in the sale/ transfer of assets and liabilities of the defunct banks to the identified purchaser,” AG report read in part.