By Mabinty M. Kamara
A coalition of Civil Society Organizations, known as the National Consortium on Public Accountability and their partners say their investigations have revealed that Rokel Commercial Bank is “grossly divided amongst two factions along political lines” and between the old folks and the new staff which if not immediately settled by the Board of Directors and the government “will have the tendency to wreck that noble revenue generating entity”.
The CSOs released the statement signed by its chairman Robert Kondema Kargbo after days of syndicated media reports alleging improper conduct on the part of the bank’s Managing Director, Dr. Dayo Walton Gilpin, a man widely credited with bringing RCB back from the brink of collapse by skillfully transforming its operations.
The consortium calls on President Julius Maada Bio to “immediately restructure the top management positions with transfers to other banking institutions”. They say the board of directors should provide strategic leadership for the bank and immediately recover all monies owed to the institution and take “punitive actions against those staff that are part of a group fighting to tarnish its hard-earned reputation as well as plans to remove the Managing Director from office”.
The coalition says since Dr. Gilpin took over within the last three years RCB has realized “huge returns in the sum of Le 52 Billion far above Le 3 Billion that used to be produced as annual returns, and that has received keen appreciation of the government and people of this country”.
This comes years into a series of attacks against Dr Gilpin with some blamed on ruling party operatives who believe he is not one of them, despite him enjoying the full confidence of President Bio who has kept him in his job.
Copyright © 2022 Politico (21/03/22)
