UK Court exposes dfcu’s flawed takeover of Sudhir’s Crane Bank

LONDON | DailyExpress – The high-profile legal battle between Crane Bank and DFCU Bank took a dramatic twist last week, as the ruling by the High Court of England and Wales cast serious doubt on the integrity of the 2017 acquisition that shook Uganda’s banking industry.

In a decision handed down by Justice Paul Stanley under case number [2025] EWHC 1915 (Comm), the UK court dismissed a central piece of evidence relied upon by DFCU Bank, a forensic audit conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Uganda, labelling it unreliable, unverifiable, and legally impermissible in a fair trial setting.

“The findings in the report, if accurate, point to management practices inconsistent with what any sensible regulator would wish to see operating a strategically important bank,” Justice Stanley remarked, but stressed that such findings could not be treated as facts without the opportunity for cross-examination.

This development severely undercuts DFCU’s long-standing justification for its takeover of Crane Bank, a transaction critics have long described as questionable, if not outright predatory.

The court’s rejection of the PwC report, which was commissioned by the Bank of Uganda following its controversial seizure of Crane Bank in October 2016, is being viewed as a major turning point. For businessman Sudhir Ruparelia—the bank’s founder and majority shareholder—it marks a significant vindication after nearly a decade of legal and reputational battles.

At the centre of the controversy is the 2017 sale of Crane Bank to DFCU Bank for what was reportedly Shs200 billion—executed without shareholder consultation, open bidding, or parliamentary oversight. Crane Bank, then Uganda’s largest locally-owned bank with over 45 branches and Shs1.8 trillion in assets, was abruptly taken over by the central bank, triggering a legal storm that has since escalated beyond Uganda’s borders.

Since that takeover, DFCU and the Bank of Uganda have heavily relied on the PwC audit to justify their actions. But the UK court’s ruling has now rendered that report effectively useless in court. Even more damning, it was revealed that PwC Uganda—the entity behind the audit—was not a globally accredited member of PwC International at the time and maintained questionable relationships with actors central to the case, raising further concerns about bias and credibility.

While the court did grant DFCU access to private digital data from Sudhir Ruparelia’s phone and his daughter Sheena Ruparelia’s email accounts for purposes of discovery, legal experts consider this a minor win compared to the damage inflicted by the disqualification of their core evidence. The result: DFCU now finds itself exposed and cornered, just months before a 12-week trial scheduled for October 2026.

Legal analysts say the ruling not only weakens DFCU’s litigation posture but may also open the door for Crane Bank to seek damages and reputational restitution. Beyond the courtroom, the judgment is already triggering renewed scrutiny into how a once-thriving indigenous bank was dismantled through what many now describe as a politically engineered and institutionally flawed process.

Genesis of the saga

The case has reignited public debate around the governance and regulatory oversight of Uganda’s financial sector, particularly the reliance on foreign consultants to validate domestic regulatory actions. For many observers, the fact that a UK court had to intervene to correct what was seen as an internal banking scandal underscores the deep trust deficit in Uganda’s financial institutions.

Founded in 1995, Crane Bank rose quickly to become a symbol of homegrown financial success, widely respected for its customer service, financial stability, and local ownership. Its collapse and subsequent handover to DFCU without transparent procedures shocked the nation and fueled accusations of state-backed economic sabotage.

The Supreme Court of Uganda had previously dealt a blow to the Bank of Uganda’s position in 2019 when it ruled that Crane Bank (in receivership) could not sue its former owners, effectively ending the central bank’s Shs397 billion legal pursuit of Sudhir Ruparelia. That defeat on domestic soil prompted Crane Bank’s owners to shift focus to international courts, culminating in the current case in London.

What’s at stake now extends far beyond the financial liability of DFCU or the personal reputation of Sudhir Ruparelia. The case has become a broader referendum on the rule of law, the limits of regulatory authority, and the credibility of foreign audit firms deployed in politically sensitive financial interventions.

As the case heads to full trial next year, the tables appear to have turned in favour of Crane Bank. For DFCU Bank, what once looked like a strategic expansion now appears to be a corporate scandal entangled in legal, ethical, and reputational risks.