Members of the Kenya Bankers Association (KBA) have elected Kenya Commercial Bank’s Group Chief Executive Officer Mr. Joshua Oigara as the new Chairman of the Governing Council and re-elected NIC Bank’s Managing Director Mr. John Gachora for another term as Council Vice Chairman. The new leadership will serve for a one year period.
Mr. Oigara takes over from Standard Chartered Bank’s Chief Executive Officer and Area General Manager for East Africa, Mr. Lamin Manjang. Mr. Manjang, who has served as KBA Chairman for two years.
Under Mr. Manjang’s leadership, KBA launched the Integrated Payment Services Limited (IPSL), the mother company of PesaLink brand. To date, 30 KBA member banks offer the PesaLink service, which moves more than Ksh 100 million in value per day. Since its launch in June 2017, PesaLink has facilitated Ksh 68 billion worth of transactions across the banking network.
In his acceptance address to members, Mr. Oigara acknowledged that the interest rate cap has remained one of the industry’s greatest challenges over the last two years, adding that it will be an area that the KBA Council will continue to engage on. “We have given proposals to make credit more accessible, and the Inuka SME Program, particularly the Ksh 30 billion fund, will be an important component of the industry’s response to concerns raised by our stakeholders,” he said.
The new KBA Chairman also committed that industry players would continue supporting IPSL in rolling out PesaLink and other FinTech innovations that promote industry efficiency and enhance the user experience for consumers of financial services.
“Governance remains an important area for us and therefore we will work to promote the KBA Charter which introduces an industry code of ethics and framework for peer accountability,” he added.
On his part, the KBA Chief Executive Officer Mr. Habil Olaka thanked the KBA members and the Council for their leadership role in the implementation of the transformation programmes that have ensured innovation, efficiency and standardization of banking services to conform to Global best practises.
