ZICA TO OPEN DOORS IN MONTH’S TIME, SAYS KALYALYA
By BUUMBA CHIMBULU THE Bank of Zambia (BoZ) has said the Intermarket Bank, which will operate under the name of Zambia Industrial Commercial Bank is expected to commence operations in the next one month.
BoZ governor, Denny Kalyalya, emphasised that the central bank was assured that the Zambia Industrial Commercial Bank would soon open.
“They (new management) are just doing the legal framework, I am assured that it will be very soon, probably in a month’s time, they will announce, they will have to look at the provision of the law from the time when we announced last time,” he said.
Dr. Kalyalya said in an interview that the process was on-going and that the central bank had so far had fruitful engagements with the new management as well as the major depositors.
“The process is moving, actually a lot is happening because there are legal provisions that are followed so we are working on that so very soon you should be hearing from the new managers, the owners of the bank to announce,
“We have engaged the major depositors, we had public hearings here in Lusaka and the Copperbelt and some kind of confirmations had to be made with them on their standing going forward. So until that is completed, we cannot make an announcement, but I am pretty sure it will be very soon,” Dr. Kalyalya said.
Government during the 2018 national budget announced that it had successfully restructured the Intermarket Banking Cooperation that closed last year.
Minister of Finance, Felix Mutati, said shareholder agreement for the new restructured bank had been concluded and the capital requirement has been met. “The new bank will operate under the name of Zambia Industrial Commercial Bank and will take over the assets of Intermarket Banking Cooperation. Management for the restructured bank has been appointed and it will soon commence operation,” Mr. Mutati said.