Ceasefire has been declared! Top-brass shareholders at the Bank of Abyssinia came to terms on Friday, November 3, ahead of a general shareholders’ meeting to be held this month. In a way, it was unprecedented.

Seven of the top shareholders under the G7 (now with the addition of Temesgen Mahere through his major share with the Nile Insurance) control 51pc of the 336 million Br bank, hence putting over 1,200 other shareholders at their whim.

They were utterly divided lately, following the summery dismissal of the Bank’s President, Kebede Temesgen, by the Board of Directors. Nevertheless, he was only a manifestation to their rather deeper mistrust and ego over their mutual interests: Bank of Abyssinia, Nile Insurance and Ethio-Investment Group.

It took weeks of reconciliation effort by a mutual friend of at least four warring shareholders. The result was a toast first at the Hilton, followed by two bottles of red wine, Nederburg, at the Sheraton on Friday night. Those who were not even on speaking terms and refused to respond to each others’ phone calls, were observed being at ease and enjoying each other’s companionship; at least that was the kind of impression they tried to give to observers. It was only Nega G. Egziyabeher who was missing from the G8, excusing himself after the meeting held at 4:00pm inside the head office of the Ethio-Investment Group and dubbed a “success”.

To the delight of Haileluel Tamru, a senior partner at HST, and the mediator, the warring factions have agreed on three major issues: that they have declared ceasefire and agreed to engage; that Kebede should be awarded a fat and generous package for “the injustice” that he was subjected to; and committed themselves to stay on the Board of Directors alone so that they mind their own business, the latter being a matter that should pass a test of time.

Although they sounded to have borrowed a vocabulary or two from the Revolutionary Democrats’ dictionary, many of them were unanimous in spelling it out that they decided to “centre the interest of the Bank”.

Indeed, the Bank, in more ways than their other two companies, involves the interest of over 1,200 shareholders – some of whom depend on the dividend for their retirement – and depositors’ money amounting to 2.3 billion Br as well as the 2.1 billion Br it has advanced as loans.

“Centre the Bank”, was the kind of dogma that brought them back together. Their other outstanding differences - as plenty and irreconcilable as they appear - are left to be solved in the “short, medium and long term” approach, whatever that may mean.

The motive for coming back together is as diverse as the individuals themselves: Some of them are quite happy because they believed the market cannot afford to have a private financial firm collapse; others think they should avoid a bad precedent of inability to work together and solve difference “in a civilized manner”. But, it is reasonable to say that others conceded because they felt they were boxed in to go against the current. Gossip advises for you to use your imagination to figure out the balance of power behind the seemingly ending boardroom politics at the Bank of Abyssinia.