Part 4: How Amity Bank Which Was Created By A Group Of Anglophones, Ended Up Becoming A Subsidiary Of An Ivorian Group.

Essimi Menye Lazare, Cameroon’s Minister of Finance from September 7, 2007 to December 9, 2011, was the person that proposed the takeover of Amity Bank, to Atlantic Financial Group

Atlantic Financial Group is the mother company of Banque Atlantique of Ivory Coast and a few other Francophone African countries, including Cameroon.   

Due to the persistent liquidity problem that Amity Bank was facing, the Central African Banking Commission, COBAC, which is the regulatory institution of the banking sector in the CEMAC Zone, finally stepped in to redress the situation of the bank, by restructuring it. Amity Bank was thus temporarily placed under COBAC, which appointed a Provisional Administrator of the bank.

 Isa Bongam – Pioneer Board Chair of Amity Bank

Quite a number of persons can be blamed for the unfortunate situation in which Amity Bank Cameroon, once the Pride of Anglophones, later found itself. That is, by frequently being in liquidity problem, which finally caused COBAC to intervene.  As for the main persons, there is of course, Isa Bongam, who bought shares for 170 million FCFA in the Amity Bank Project. He was the biggest shareholder, and so became the Pioneer Board Chair of Amity Bank.

But unfortunately Bongam turned around and quietly borrowed 150 million FCFA from the young financial institution, while still parading himself as the majority shareholder and Board Chair of Amity Bank. That was in fact the root cause of the very destructive conflict that erupted between Bongam and Lawrence Tasha, the Pioneer General Manager of Amity Bank. The war that Bongam launched against Tasha, which among other things featured a number of court cases, caused a lot of damages both to the financial situation of Amity Bank, as well as to the image of the bank.

Lawrence Tahsa – Initiator Of Amity Bank Project / Pioneer GM of The Bank

Lawrence Tasha, the professional banker, who was the initiator of the Amity Bank Project, and who became the Pioneer General Manager of Amity Bank, has his own share of the blame, in the shameful situation in which Amity Bank ended up being plunged.  After becoming  the Board Chair / General Manager (PDG) of Amity Bank, Lawrence Tasha abandoned his American way of doing things, and started acting in the typical style of Cameroonian millionaires of the public service, even though he was of the private sector.   Tasha got involved in local politics in his native Kumbo in Bui Division, Northwest Region, and even became a Section President of the ruling CPDM.  Tasha got as big traditional title. Tasha got involved in the management, or better still in the funding of a football club in his native Kumbo, that is, Kumbo Strikers, a then First Division Club. All these were financial drain pipes, and of course Amity Bank was affected.

Christophe Silienou – Last Board Chair of Amity Bank  

There was also Christophe Silienou, the PDG of SCTM Gas, who led a small but troublesome group of Bami shareholders of Amity Bank. The discredit they did to the image of Amity Bank in their fight to take over the management of the financial institution, was much. Again,  when Silienou fought his way and finally succeeded to become the Board Chair of Amity Bank,  he turned out not be different from the former Majority Shareholder and Pioneer Board Chair of bank , Isa Bongam. Christophe Silienou, who hailed from the West Region of Cameroon, pumped in 400 million francs FCA into the capital of Amity Bank, and became the Majority Shareholder and Board Chair of Amity Bank, which was originally designed to be an Anglophone Bank.

But the bad thing was than the new Board Chairman of Amity Bank, Christophe Silienou, in flagrant violation of the text, unilaterally appointed a new General Manager of the bank. The new General Manager was not only his loyal friend and tribesman, but was also somebody with questionable competence to be the General Manager of a commercial bank. Worse of all, Silienou after pumping in 400 million FCFA to become the new Majority Shareholder and Board Chair of Amity Bank, and after unilaterally appointing his stooge as General Manager of  the financial institution, quietly and  took a number of loans from the bank, almost to the total sum  of the 400 million FCFA that he pumped in to revive the finances of the bank. That once again plunged Amity Bank into liquidity problem, and this time around, COBAC was forced to intervene.

COBAC Restructures Amity Bank 

Meanwhile, Amity Bank, under the management of the Administrator appointed by COBAC, successfully went through the restructuring process under COBAC. As is generally the case, the restructuring of Amity Bank was supposed to end with the pumping in of additional capital to revive the bank financially. Generally to achieve this, the bank was supposed to be opened to a new majority shareholder, preferable a credible and big financial institution, to come in with the required capital and expertise, and join the old shareholders of the bank. At this stage it is more the Cameroon Government and not COBAC that does the supervision or control, to ensure that the new Majority Shareholder is credible.

That for example was what happened to the Union Bank of Cameroon, UBC.  COBAC intervened when Union Bank had serious liquidity problem, due apparently to poor management. So many heavy loans were given out, under questionable conditions. COBAC intervened, appointed an Administrator and restructured Union Bank. After the restructuring, a Nigerian bank, Oceanic; came with new capital, and became the majority shareholder of Union Bank.  That was what observers thought would also happen to Amity Bank, after COBAC restructured it.

Enters Atlantic Financial Group Of Ivory Coast

Meanwhile by the time COBAC was rounding up with the restructuring of Amity Bank, it coincidentally happened that the Atlantic Financial Group, AFG, of the Ivorian billionaire, Bernard Kone Doitongu, wanted to expand to the Central African Sub – region, that is the Central African Economic and Monetary Community, CEMAC Zone. AFG wanted to create a subsidiary or an affiliate in Cameroon, which it considered as the gateway into the sub – region. The Ministry of Finance was of course the technical ministry in Cameroon that the Atlantic Financial Group, normally had to contact with its project to create a subsidiary in the country. Worthy of note, that in coming to Cameroon, the Atlantic Financial Group did not have Amity Bank in mind. The project of the Atlantic Financial Group as regard Cameroon was to create a subsidiary or an affiliate in the country, just as UBA Cameroon Ecobank Cameroun, others with foreign capital were created.

 Minister Of Finance, Essimi Menye, Proposes Amity Bank To Ivorian Group

The delegation of the Atlantic Financial Group arrived Cameroon and met the then Minister of Finance, Essimi Menye Lazare, to formally present the Group’s project to open a subsidiary in the country. It was Minister Essimi Menye who instead proposed Amity Bank to the Ivorian Group. The minister was said to have presented the advantages that Atlantic Financial Group would have, in taking over Amity Bank that had just been restructured, than the Ivorian Group having to start from scratch in the country.

Suffice to say after a number of discussions between Atlantic Financial Group and Cameroon’s Minister of Finance, the Group accepted Minister Essimi Menye’s proposal, because they saw that it would in fact greatly facilitate things for them as the minister had pointed out.  A  the Minister Essimi Menye pointed out, Amity Bank had structures on the ground, as well as personnel and customers, that the Atlantic Financial Group was simply to take over. If the Atlantic Financial Group had refused to take over Amity Bank and decided to create its own subsidiary or affiliate in Cameroon from scratch, it would have entailed setting up offices in a number of towns, recruiting workers, and  hunting for customers.

Amity Bank Cameroon Becomes Banque Atlantique  Cameroun

Suffice to say that the Ivorian group, Atlantic Financial Group, accepted the proposal of Cameroon’s Minister of Finance, Essimi Menye Lazare, took over Amity Bank Cameroon, and re-baptized it as BANQUE ATLANTIQUE CAMEROUN.  That was how Amity Bank that was created by a group of Anglophone elite, and which became the pride of the pride of Anglophones, ended up becoming an affiliate of an Ivorian Group, the Atlantic Financial Group.

But what has never been made public is the detail of the terms of the deal, especially the financial part of the deal that was struck by Minister Essimi Menye and the Ivorian group, the Atlantic Financial Group. Knowing the way members of government in Cameroon do things, it is certain that Essimi Menye could not have done what he unscrupulously did with Amity Bank, without his selfish personal financial interest in the deal.

                    WATCH OUT FOR LAST PART

 In Part 5, Which Will Be The Last Part Of The Amity Bank Story, The Mentor Will Look At The Controversies That Surrounded The Takeover Of Amity Bank Cameroon By The Ivorian Group (Atlantic Financial Group),  The Lame Arguments Of Cameroon’s Minister Of Finance, Essimi Menye,  The Legal Battle That Followed,  And The Reaction Of The Cameroon Government.