A Kenyan court has ordered the freezing of Equity Bank Holdings’ acquisition of Spire Bank until a dispute over the fate of employees in the troubled lender is resolved.
Spire Bank’s employees, through the Bank Insurance and Finance Union (BIGU), sued to block the acquisition, arguing their employer had not been transparent in the process.
Justice Maureen Onyango of the Employment and Labour Relations court ordered, “That in the meantime, status quo as of the date of this court’s orders to be maintained until either party agrees on suitable undertaking, and is signed by the respondent (union).”
The case will be mentioned on October 31.
Equity Bank (Kenya) Limited announced that it had entered into an Assets and Liabilities purchase agreement with Spire Bank Limited to purchase certain assets and liabilities.
Equity Bank Kenya Limited will acquire approximately 20,000 deposit customers with deposits totalling Kshs 1.3 billion and 3,700 loan customers with outstanding loan balances at Kshs 1.7 billion, with a net carrying value of Kshs 0.9 billion after adjusting for statutory loan loss provisions of Kshs 0.8 billion.
Equity Bank Inks Asset and Liabilities Purchase Agreement With Spire Bank
