SOUTHERN PROVINCE

RUHANGO—The manager of Bank Populaire’s Tambwe branch is being held by police over allegatgions of corruption and embezzlement.

Salomon Mbarushimana was arrested last week and is accused of offering illegal loans up to Frw50 million to family, friends and close relatives.

He has also been accused of offering fake bank cheques to clients and soliciting personal loans in the names of ghost clients.

Police officials say that the investigation began and ended within the bank. "Mbarushimana’s arrest is solely an initiative of the bank top bosses, who alerted police to detain him until the investigation into case is complete” a spokesman at the station said.

Bank president Felix Kamali confirmed the arrest and said the bank is working aggressively to handle the situation.

"It’s true that Mbarushimana has been temporary arrested as a matter of prevention, and there is an investigation team from the Union of Bank Populaire in Kigali, which has spent four days probing the loans accounts management,” Kamali said.

"The daily services are going on well and the bank will handle the case despite the fact that most clients are not fully aware of this case,” he added.

If convicted, Mbarushimana could face up to three years in prison.

Bank Populaire Tambwe is one of the state-of the-art banks in Southern Province and has over 4000 clients to date.

On July 27th 2007, the bank was awarded a certificate of merit from the Rwanda Revenue Authority in recognition of its contribution to the 2006 fiscal year.

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