Barclays bank Africa has taken a huge blow after one of its biggest shareholder, the UK Barclays PLC, withdrew a huge sum of its shares from Barclays Africa Group. Following this occurrence, the bank has announced that come May of this year, the bank will change its name from Barclays Kenya to Absa. Barclays is one of the oldest banks in Kenya and has been operational for over 100 years in the country.
Hope for Barclays
Does this mishappening seem familiar to you? Of course, we all know the case of Telkom Kenya. When its biggest Shareholder, The Orange group withdrew from the company, they probably thought that the company would go underwater or even worse collapse. However, there is one thing that stands out about these successions.
The biggest shareholders are the decision makers of the organization. When they feel that their decisions aren’t baring fruits, they tend to lose interest in that market. Oblivious to them, the subtle shareholders and stakeholders have a greater power to transform a company since they understand the market better.
The can customize their services to suit the needs of the people in that specific market rather than offering generic foreign services. Only a year after the succession of Telkom from Orange and it has already hit the 4million subscribers mark.
We can only hope that the Barclays bank group will roll their sleeves like Telkom did. They can transform that misfortune to be the greatest opportunity for the bank to stand on its own. Barclays Intends to trade as Absa Group limited across all countries it operates in Africa. This change will commence after the Bank holds its Annual General Meeting later this year. The same will be replicated in Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, Seychelles, Mozambique, Zambia and Mauritius.
