By Wezzie Gausi
Attorney General Frank Mbeta says the government will “strongly” challenge a compensation claim reportedly estimated at about K1 trillion in the long-running legal dispute involving Finance Bank Malawi Limited and the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM).
Mbeta said government lawyers and financial experts were still analysing the figures submitted by Finance Bank ahead of the court’s assessment of damages.
Speaking after the matter was adjourned Monday, Mbeta said the claim was huge and required more time for government experts to prepare a counter response.
“We are still on a journey because the experts are doing our counter response. They actually need a bit more time to finish. It is a very big claim, so they need a bit more time,” Mbeta said.
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He added that the matter had been adjourned to June 15, 2026 before the assessment of damages.
Mbeta said the government did not agree with the amount being claimed.
“We will look at what they are looking for so that we can seriously challenge those figures. We don’t believe that it is payable that way. It is way too much,” he said.
The case stems from a February 2026 Supreme Court of Appeal ruling which found that RBM and the government acted unlawfully when they suspended Finance Bank’s foreign currency operations and revoked its banking licence in 2005 without giving the bank a fair hearing.
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The Supreme Court overturned an earlier High Court judgement which had ruled in favour of RBM and allowed Finance Bank’s counterclaim for damages, with the assessment of compensation left to the Assistant Registrar of the court.
Finance Bank lawyer Wapona Kita earlier said the compensation relates to business losses and profits the bank could have earned from 2005 to date following its closure.
The bank was closed in 2005 after RBM accused it of engaging in irregular forex transactions and failing to comply with ‘Know Your Customer’ requirements.
