A twitter user @TheMacharia posted yester evening that @Coopbankenya Greenhouse branch manager John Karinga called his mother aside to confirm that the dude[her son] that had escorted her was not forcing her to withdraw cash.
John Karinga Lauded
The bank manager should even been promoted for being extra cautious and always putting his customers safety first. We had cases where people get robbed in broad daylight, and most of such cases backfire to the Bank managers who are responsible for daily operations.
Kenyans with dreadlocks and many that prefer to keep Afro were cussing the manager on the grounds that he had labelled one of them as JAMBAZI. The felt discriminated but what would you have done it it was you?
According to Coop bank site, the branch manager is responsible for supervising and managing a bank branch. They oversee financial reporting, hire and train staff, and grow branch revenue. Duties include managing and supervising employees, assisting customers, and providing excellent customer service.
In a nutshell, they oversee front-office operations, provide high levels of customer service and direct regular team meetings and training sessions.
Coop Bank also responded to The Macharia and explained to him what the managers roles are. He got satisfied and even decided he needs a shave!
Hello Macharia. We always exercise vigilance for our customers' sake. Thank you for taking time to share this feedback with us. You are more than welcome to visit us again. Cheers. ^EL
— Co-op Bank Kenya (@Coopbankenya) March 7, 2020
Late last year, six sharply dressed armed gangsters swaggered into Standard Chartered, Moi Avenue branch and after five minutes, they casually walked out with Sh96 million stuffed in three gunny bags without firing a single shot. With almost divine calm, the thugs had emptied the entire strong room of a tier-one bank’s headquarters, making it one of Kenya’s biggest bank heists yet.
A hardened top city detective described the daylight heist as “mafia-style” pointing out that in his entire career as a law enforcer, he had never seen such a brazen and daring gang.
“I have not seen anything like this and I can assure you that it was an inside and well-executed job,” Nairobi area Criminal Investigations Department boss, Salim Swaleh, told the press.
According to The East African Standard, until this raid, the biggest bank robbery had involved a Sh74 million hold-up in February 1993 on the junction of Nairobi’s Dennis Pritt Road, State House and Ralph Bunche roads. About 14 armed gangsters had waylaid an International Red Cross official, Sami Sidani, shortly after he had withdrawn the cash from a city bank.
The thugs shot a few times in the air before ordering the IRC official to hand over the cash, in Kenya shillings and American dollars. They then stashed the loot in bags and briefcases, hopped into a getaway car and sped off emptying more magazines in their wake.
In July 1999, a business executive, Charles Omondi Odhiambo, walked into the Embakasi strong room of Kenya Air Freight Handling Ltd and left with a staggering Sh54.7 million.
“It was arguably one of the easiest thefts of its magnitude ever pulled off in the region,” wrote The East African Standard.
Such were the daring robberies that sometimes ended with casualties on the police, robbers and even civilians. But, as Kenya’s most famous bank robber John Kiriamiti would put it, “crime, was not the grim dirty business of desperate men, but the preserve of the fearless”.
