Uganda is the fastest growing section of the Fina Bank's operations in East Africa. Of all the places that the bank has ever opened up, Uganda has registered the highest number of accounts taken in the shortest time of one week.

Last week Fina Bank officially opened its banking halls to the public with over 500 bank accounts registered.

Uganda is also the only operation that Fina Bank has started right from scratch; the Rwanda operation was a buyout of Africa Intercontinental Bank in Kigali while the Kenya operation was one that grew over time.

Started over 20 years ago as a non-financial organisation in Kenya's capital city, Nairobi, Fina Bank Limited today has a chain of branches spread throughout Kenya and is spreading its operations to two of the five East African countries.

The bank currently has presence in Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda. Plans are under way to open shop in Tanzania and Burundi.

Fina Bank was upgraded into a commercial bank in the late 1980's and today has 13 branches in Kenya and two branches in Uganda. Other locations have been identified for Mbarara and Kabale branches to link Fina Bank Uganda with Fina Bank Rwanda.

According to Frank Griffiths, the Managing Director of Fina Bank in Uganda, the success of the bank in Kenya can be attributed to the fact that the proprietors of the bank realised early that there was need to find a means and to consequently create a platform through which the small and medium enterprises could access credit to further grow their business.

"Today I was at the Nakivubo branch (one of Fina Banks branches in Uganda) and I realised that the philosophy for which the bank stood was well represented in Nakivubo," Griffiths said. Nakivubo is a market zone in Kampala that mainly serves small and medium-sized enterprise businesses.

The bank is owned by four shareholders, from the United Kingdom and Kenya.

Griffiths, who has been in the banking sector for 41 years now, first with Barclays and then later with Fina Bank says that while he was working for Barclays in Uganda, (1998-2004) he got well acquainted with the trading norms of Ugandans, which is not different from that of the Kenyan, where he served after leaving Uganda.

Fina Bank is one of those organisations that have decided to go cross-border in anticipation of the creation of a single trading bloc called the East African Federation. Other banks in the region that now operate in most of the East African countries include, Barclays, Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB), Stanbic Bank Limited, Bank of Africa and Diamond Trust Bank among others.

Unlike a number of banks that join a new market and promise a number of changes overnight, Griffiths says Fina will address the already existing problems with emphasis to the plight of that segment of society that is usually turned away by the bigger banks because they don't have the collateral to acquire a loan.

"It is important to note that the key drivers in an economy are not the big players in that economy but the various small players when collected together. That is the reason Fina Bank exists and that is why we are trying to link the whole of East Africa together," Griffiths added.

About the future of the bank in the Great Lakes region, there is hope amongst top bank officials that a move into Southern Sudan and the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo is an option thought that is in the long term.

Griffiths further said they had expanded their Kenyan branch network with new branches in Nakuru and Eldoret. A further seven branches were in plan for Kenya before the end of 2008.

In Rwanda, Fina Bank has completed the renovation of the main branch in Kigali and embarked on the utilization of an energetic team of SME loans officers whose presence has already begun making significance in that market.

The bank also relocated its branch in Remera to new premises and new branches in Gitarama and Gisenyi are now open.

"It is clear that our strategy is beginning to bear fruit, resulting in the bank policy of handling the SME sector in Kenya. The bank received the award for "Best Bank in SME Banking" in Kenya last year. This is clear testimony to the impact that our relationship managers are having in the Kenya market," Griffiths said.

In 2007 Fina Bank was able to negotiate and receive a very flexible long-term line of credit from the European Investment Bank. This loan is expected to enable the bank to offer fixed rate loans for a term of up to 10 years to SME clients.

This move is particularly useful for expensive capital items or factory extensions where longer term finance is required. The ability to provide a fixed rate over the term of the loan provides customers with cost certainty over the length of the project being financed.