NMB Bank Plc lists gains of Tanzania’s first virtual AGM
Dar es Salaam. NMB Bank Plc revealed yesterday that its just-ended Annual General Meeting (AGM) attracted the highest number of participants in the lender’s history.
Acting managing director Ruth Zaipuna (pictured) said in a statement yesterday that over 1,000 shareholders participated in the virtual AGM – the first ever to have been organized by a listed company in Tanzania’s history.
“Apart from the 2020 virtual conference, no other AGM in the last one decade managed to attract more than 600 participants in its deliberations. This proves the pivotal power of digital technology in business operations and management,” she said.
As part of initiatives to contain further spread of the Covid-19 pandemic, NMB Bank Plc held its virtual AGM earlier this month.
According to MsZaipuna, the bank’s pre-investment in digital transformation of its operations, made it easy for a virtual AGM to be conducted seamlessly until the end.
She said the virtual AGM has been a monumental step in supporting the adoption, increased use and advancement of new technologies in the country as Tanzania strives to create a digitally supported national economy.
“We are happy to have successfully conducted our first ever digital AGM, which also paves the way for other companies to follow suit and accrue the benefits derived from the investment. We made this history by becoming the first company listed on the Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange (DSE) to embark on the virtual initiative,” MsZaipuna noted.
She said success of the investment and its many merits over the traditional ways of conducting annual shareholders’ meetings will inevitably make other listed firms adopt the NMB Bank’s novel idea.
“Following the Covid-19 outbreak, we are leveraging on the best of technology in digital banking, innovative products like NMB Mkononi, Internet Banking, Cashless payments through point of sales and other service delivery channels like NMB Wakala,” explained the bank’s head of communications and corporate affairs, Ms Eunice Chiume, noting that the investment in the digital AGM was made along the same line.
MsZaipuna said the virtual gathering was cost effective in all senses of the term and should be the way of conducting AGMs and other strategic meetings for the bank going forward.
During the AGM, NMB Bank Plc shareholders approved Sh48 billion in dividend, being a 45 percent increase to its prior year dividend payout.
