Tribunal okays African Bank’s acquisition

African Bank claims that it appreciates each approval that it has so far gotten for its full acquisition of Grindrod Bank. On October 6, 2022, all prerequisites for the Grindrod Bank deal were fulfilled, and all the regulatory clearances were received.

This comes after a merger clearance certificate and the Competition Tribunal’s unconditional approval of its acquisition of Grindrod Bank. According to the Tribunal’s certificate, the acquisition has been allowed in accordance with Section 16(2) of the Act after consideration of all pertinent material and the Competition Commission’s proposal.

African Bank CEO Kennedy Bungane said: “This is an important step in the process of final incorporation and we commend the Commission and the Tribunal for their hard work and swift decisions.”

According to Bungane, this is the first step towards African Bank’s acceptance of Grindrod Bank and the institution’s beneficial contribution to bolstering and enhancing its business banking capabilities.

African Bank announced in May of this year that it intended to purchase Grindrod Bank from Grindrod Limited for R1.5 billion, arguing that this would speed up its entry into the South African business banking market.

At the time, Bungane stated that the acquisition is a component of African Bank’s Excelerate25 strategy, which aims to diversify and create a full-fledged middle-of-the-pyramid business banking offering. Bungane added that the acquisition enables the company to accomplish these goals quickly and efficiently.

Excellent planning has, according to him, been done across all areas of the two organisations to enable seamless integration.