Johannesburg — AFRICAN Bank Investments (Abil) will launch its second black equity ownership programme tomorrow which will be open to all black investors as well as the staff of Ellerine, African Bank and Standard General Insurance.

This comes as the battle for black ownership of banks heats up with the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party accusing the local industry of trying to avoid selling stakes to black investors.

Abil said its second empowerment deal was to "restore the combined shareholding of the two schemes to the levels that existed prior to the Ellerine acquisition".

In 2005 Abil launched its first empowerment scheme, under a vehicle called Eyomhlaba Investment Holdings. But early this year Abil bought furniture retailer Ellerine and this diluted the empowerment shareholding from 6,8% to 4,3% because Abil issued 294,7-million shares to complete the acquisition.

Abil, SA's biggest provider of unsecured loans, plans to sell R281m of shares to the new scheme named Masonge, which means "Let's save".

Masonge will hold a 1,4% stake in Abil, pushing the bank's total empowerment shareholding to 5,8%. Labour is demanding that banks have direct black ownership of 15% but with the banks governed by the Financial Sector Charter, ownership targets are set at 10%. Abil said yesterday it planned to sell at least 10% of the company to black investors by 2015.

Masonge aims to raise about R106,8m from shareholders, R89m from an initial public offering and R17,8m from issuing shares to new Ellerine employees over the next few years.

The proceeds of the initial public offer and future issue of shares would be used to buy more Abil shares in the open market.

The interim directors of Masonge will be Mpho Nkeli, a director of companies including Alexander Forbes and Abil; Dawn Marole, a director of companies and previous deputy CE of Fabcos; and Nithia Nalliah, Abil's chief financial officer.