Business
Unity Bank : Why Semenitari quit CEO position
The recapitalisation exercise, according to the source, saw the dilution of some shares of prominent Northerners.
The bank had raised N39.224bn via the rights issue and private placement in a bid to revamp its operations, a move that was endorsed by the bank’s shareholders at an Extraordinary General Meeting in December 2013.
Unity Bank is the only bank with northern ownership that survived the consolidation programme implemented by former CBN governor Prof. Charles Soludo in 2006.
Again, experts suggest that the bank was spared in 2010 because of northern sentiment when the immediate past CBN governor, Emir Lamido Sanusi, came with the surgeon’s knife, which saw six banks on the operating table with only one survival.
One of the legacy banks that merged as Unity bank is Bank of the North, a financial icon established by the northern region premier, Sir Ahmadu Bello and owned by the 19 northern states.
The Rights Issue was made at 50k per share to raise funds to finance branch expansion, infrastructure upgrade in support of automated and cashless payment, enhance information technology and additional working capital.
The management team of Unity Bank under Henry Semenitari, who assumed office as GMD two years ago, turned it around its fortunes from doldrums.
The bank surprisingly declared profit after tax of N10.692billion in its audited results for 2014.
The results had symbolised the bank’s return to profitability after declaring a loss after tax of N22.582bn in the previous year 20123. Unity Bank made a profit before tax of N13.639bn, compared to a loss before tax of N33.639bn for the year ended December 31, 2013.
Further details showed the bank grew its interest and similar income from N52.195bn in 2013 to N62.635bn in the year under review, indicating a 20 per cent rise year-on-year. Its earnings per share now stand at N17.45, compared to a negative position of N58.75 in 2013. Also, the bank grew its total assets by 2.2 per cent from N403.629bn to N413.305bn.
Mr. Semeniteri, who became GMD on January 9, 2014 started showing promise for the bank as, their efforts started yielding results after the bank released its third quarter results, which showed a 900 per cent growth in profit.
Semenitari has valued and consistent Banking experience in Operations, Internal Control, Commercial and Retail Banking, Consumer Banking, Corporate Banking (Energy) etc. acquired from various Banks over a 22-year career at First City Monument Bank (FCMB), Zenith Bank, Diamond Bank, United Bank for Africa, ACB International Bank and Continental Trust Bank.
He has held senior Management positions in UBA Plc as an Assistant General Manager – Commercial and Retail Banking Group; General Manager (Credit and Marketing) in ACB International Bank Plc; Acting Managing Director/CEO, ACB International Bank Plc; Executive Director (Business Development) in Continental Bank Limited and General Manager Afribank Nigeria Plc, in charge of Consumer and Retail Banking with the responsibility of supervising and developing business activities across the entire 150 branch network.
He was Executive Director Retail and Enterprise Banking at First City Monument Bank Plc with responsibility for developing and growing Retail and Enterprise Banking business across the entire branch network.
Mr. Semenitari’s recognized strengths are in Business Process Re-engineering and Design with specialization in Strategic Process Enterprise Management and Integration of Business process models with Information Technology, to drive business at Product and Strategic business unit levels.
In addition to these, he has development and implementation experience of major Banking Applications such as Micro Banker/Flexcube, Phoenix, Bank Master, SAP (Systems Application and Product), Globus and Finacle Banking Application etc.
Meanwhile, Mr Semenitari’ s parting gift to the Bank was the impressive half year results for the period ended June 30, 2015 in which profit grew to N7.897billion compared with N7.108billion in 2014.
