A golden goodbye for CRDB’s Kimei

Dar es Salaam. The CRDB Bank board, management and employees have awarded Dr Charles Kimei for steering the bank to phenomenal success for two decades.

The ‘award’ is in the form of various prizes worth hundreds of millions of shillings in total given to the immediate past managing director of the bank as a golden handshake on his retirement from service.

The grand event, which was held at Mlimani City in Dar es Salaam on Saturday, was full of fanfare and inspirational speeches as the bank’s employees and board members joined Dr Kimei’s family to celebrate the seasoned banker’s 21 years of service at the helm of Tanzania’s largest lender.

The board of directors presented a brand new Toyota Land Cruiser 2018 (VX-V8), whose price is anything between Sh300 million and Sh400 million.

“You will always be a CRDB Bank champion and a family member – and we will always seek your advice,” said the CRDB Bank board chairman, Mr Allay Laay, amid great applause.

During the 21 years of Dr Kimei’s leadership, CRDB initiated three subsidiaries, namely: CRDB Insurance Broker, CRDB Microfinance, and CRDB Burundi. In recognition of Dr Kimei’s achievements, the CRDB Insurance Brokers general manager, Mr Arthur Mosha, pledged full insurance cover for all his properties for the next five years – including “your house and everything inside it,” Mr Mosha said.

Some managers and directors from the bank’s headquarters deposited Sh5 million into Dr Kimei’s fixed deposit account, while another group bought CRDB shares for their former chief.

Speaking during the event, Dr Kimei said he was retiring a happy man who managed to turn CRDB’s performance around during his 21 years of management.

Formerly a director of Economic Research and Policy at the central Bank of Tanzania (BoT), Dr Kimei joined CRDB in 1998 when the private commercial bank had Sh54 billion in assets. Currently, the assets are valued at Sh6 trillion.

During the period, CRDB’s core capital rose from a relatively measly Sh2 billion to about Sh800 billion today.

Customers’ deposits have risen from Sh40 billion in 1998 to about Sh5 trillion, while the number of branches has risen from 20 in 1998 to about 260 today.

In 1998, CRDB registered a loss of Sh2 billion, a status that had been turned around to a record profit-after-tax of Sh129 in 2015.

However, that net profit dropped to Sh63.7 billion in 2016 –and dropped further to Sh30.8 billion in 2017 as the company sought to clean up its loans books.

“When I joined CRDB, my intention was to head a leading bank that is conveniently everywhere. Profits are an outcome of the foundation that has been built overtime… As a result, after creating the team, we embarked on reinvesting the earned profits,” Mr Kimei said.

The new CRDB Bank’s managing director, Mr Abdulmajid Nsekela, promised to sustain Dr Kimei’s success – and in fact ensure that the asset size reaches double digits.

“We are proud of the team that you built… You have left a legacy of success. The challenge is to keep the success sustained,” he said, detailing how he joined CRDB, and the support he received from Dr Kimei way back in late 1990s and early 2000s.

Another person who also spoke highly of Dr Kimei was Ms Ester Kitoka, the bank’s deputy managing director for Shared Services. Ms Kitoka also worked with Dr Kimei during the time when both were BoT employees.

“This is my second time to celebrate and bid farewell to Dr Kimei. The first time was in 1998 when he left the BoT to join CRDB – and I am now bidding him farewell again as he retires from CRDB,” she said.

She described Mr Kimei as “a down-to-earth person who readily lends an ear to every employee irrespective of rank.”