The Bank of Kigali’s plans of opening a representative office in Kampala, Uganda have got a boost after the Bank of Uganda assured the lender it (Bank of Uganda) would enact regulations to govern foreign banks that wanted to establish offices in their market, Lawson Naibo, the chief operations officer, has said.

Naibo noted that the Ugandan banking law, unlike in Kenya, has no provisions for a foreign bank to open representative offices; the law only allows setting up of a fully-fledged bank.

"They have informed us that they will enact enabling regulations and laws. So, the approval of our application depends on that,” he said in a telephone interview yesterday.

Bank of Kigali (BK) applied to Bank of Uganda, requesting to set up a representative office in the country last year. 

The bank early last year, opened a representative office in Nairobi, Kenya, making it the first local bank to invest outside Rwanda.

Naibo said Bank of Kigali was looking at opening a representative office in Uganda before opening a fully-fledged bank, as they study the market first.

He said the move is part of the bank’s expansion drive that will eventually see it open branches across the region to facilitate trans-border businesses.