Chase and Imperial Banks receivership updates

The last week of June was quite eventful for Chase and Imperial – two banks in receivership in Kenya.

First, former Chase Bank Chairman Zafrullah Khan was hauled before a court. He was charged with committing a Kshs 1.7 billion fraud at the bank and was then freed on bond after two nights in jail so he could travel to the US for medical treatment.

Mr Khan had appeared before Senior Principal Magistrate Martha Mutuku where he was charged with conspiring to defraud Chase Bank of nearly Sh1.7 billion besides three counts of stealing…
The court heard that Mr Khan had committed the offence of conspiring to defraud Chase Bank Sh1,683,000,000 by falsely pretending that the money had been disbursed to accounts of Carmelia Investments Limited, Cleopatra Holdings, Golden Azure Limited and Colnbrook Holdings as genuine loan facilities.

There were reports that seven other officials of the bank were being sought, but so far only Khan was charged.

On the same day that Khan was in court, Imperial Bank depositors had a meeting with the Governor of the Central Bank. It was quite a long session, after which they surprisingly endorsed support for the new turnaround plan at Imperial that was revealed last week. The despises of Chase have a had a long receivership period, and many of their large depositors still have not got the bulk of their savings and funds from the bank in the 21 months since the bank closed.