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A DEARTH of trust between Kingdom Bank Botswana creditors and liquidator, Deloitte’s Max Marinelli, has seen the relationship between the two parties irretrievably breaking down leading to the resignation of the later.

A creditors meeting held in Gaborone last week resolved to relieve Marinelli of his duties and proposed to appoint a new liquidator.

Director of tax services at Deloitte, Terry Brick said their company was no longer handling the liquidation process and will hand over to the proposed new liquidator, Peter Collins, once he has been endorsed.

“There has been a breakdown of the relationship with creditors losing confidence in the process. We seemed to disagree mostly on the process of liquidation and less on the estimated recoverability of the assets. They seemed to want to take the liquidation process to Zimbabwe, which is unfeasible since this was a Botswana company. They also want to be consulted at each and every stage, which is not tenable. Creditors are supposed to give the liquidators a chance to do his job,” Brick said.

KBAL, which had no resident depositors based in Botswana, was last May placed under liquidation due to insolvency after an audit uncovered a $18.7 million (P200 million) mismatch between assets and liabilities.

Marinelli was then appointed liquidator the same month but the liquidation process was derailed at a meeting held in November after creditors declined to give him autonomous authority to sell the assets of the defunct offshore bank.

The KBAL creditors instead proposed to form a steering committee that would work hand in glove with the liquidator and jointly approve the sale of any assets.

“We seem to have lost trust in the way the liquidator is handling this process,” said Chap Masterson, a spokesperson of the creditors. “The liquidator hasn’t provided us with enough information for us to be able to make informed decisions. It would be imprudent for us to adopt all these resolutions, some of which are too general and open-ended.”

Among some of the 29 resolutions that needed to be passed for the liquidation to progress included; authorising the liquidator to collect outstanding debts, institute legal action against debtors, sell immovable assets by public auction and engage lawyers and auditors.

The creditors also declined a resolution for the liquidator to pay himself P348,500 for the work he has done since his engagement in May. According to Brick, Deloitte’s bill now stands at P600,000, which the creditors, at last week’s meeting, agreed to settle once the liquidation process with Collins is underway KBAL depositors and debtors are predominantly in Zimbabwe where the bank originates. – Mmegi