Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE parties in145bn/- execution proceedings involving FBME Bank Limited and Coast Textiles Limited on Sunday locked horns on whether the office of the Solicitor General should be allowed to represent the Director of Deposit Insurance Board (DIB), Mr Isack Kihwili, in the matter.
While Advocate Joseph Rutabingwa asked the High Court to bar the Solicitor General to appear for the DIB under the Bank of Tanzania (BoT), which is the Liquidator of the FBME Bank, because there are no government interests in the matter, State Attorney Edwin Wediro submitted to the contrary.
Judge Amir Mruma, who is hearing the matter before High Court said he will deliver the ruling on the matter on February 22, 2022.
It was State Attorney Wediro from the Solicitor General’s office who initiated the motion after indicating to represent both Mr Kihwili and Consolidated Holding Corporation.
However, Advocate Rutabingwa, for Coast Textiles Limited, vehemently opposed such move, saying he was in doubt whether the Solicitor General could represent the FBME Bank in liquidation at the moment having declined to do so in other several applications involving the proceedings.
The seasoned lawyer told the court that the issue of representation resurfaced in an application lodged by the Bank for extension of time within which to appeal to the Court of Appeal wherein the Solicitor General categorically stated he could not stand for both the bank and Consolidate Holding Corporation.
According to him, the reason advanced by Senior State Attorney Abubarkar Mlisha from the Solicitor General’s office was that FBME Bank was a private bank with no public interest involved and the DIB was brought on board because of liquidation process.
“Such state attorney told the court that the DIB should be served on their own so that they can appear in court. Pursuant to that, a fresh summons was issued to DIB and the application they filed was dismissed when they failed to appear,” he submitted.
Similarly, the advocate told the court that DIB were being served personally in subsequent application that resulted into execution proceeding.
“Therefore, the Solicitor General cannot come at this ours to represent the DIB in these execution proceedings,” he submitted.
In his responses to the request, Mr Wediro told the court that in terms of section 37 (1) of the Banking and Financial Institutions Act, the DIB is a government institution, whose powers are to act as liquidator of financial institutions as may be directed by the BoT.
He submitted that the DIB was approached by the BoT to be the liquidator of FBME Bank and in that capacity it could sue or be sued.
“The FBME Bank which is under liquidation is under the DIB, which is a government institution, thus, the Solicitor General has powers to represent them,” he said.
Coast Textiles Limited, a local company, has decided to seek the intervention of the High Court in Dar es Salaam, after failure by FBME Bank, whose operations were taken over by the BoT, to implement the judgment given by Judge Aloysius Mujulizi in 2015, which is more than six years ago, on such payments.
The company is requesting the sum of 145,946,500,641/- be realized from the DIB, the Liquidators of FBME Bank, default of which the Director of DIB be held accountable.
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