Kenyan hospital tycoon Jayesh Saini wins approval to take over ABC Bank

Kenyan healthcare tycoon Jayesh Saini has won approval from the Competition Authority of Kenya to take sole control of African Banking Corporation Ltd., a Nairobi-based lender known as ABC Bank, moving the owner of one of the country's largest private clinic networks a step closer to running a bank.

The deal still needs clearance from the Central Bank of Kenya, which vets anyone seeking to buy a controlling stake in a lender and must judge whether new owners are fit and proper to run one. The terms of the transaction, including the size of the stake Saini is buying, the price and the identity of the sellers, have not been made public.

ABC Bank is one of Kenya's smaller lenders, with 12 branches and total assets of about 50 billion shillings ($385 million), according to the central bank's 2025 bank supervision report. The bank traces its roots to Consolidated Finance Co., a finance house set up in 1981, and became a commercial bank in 1995. Shamaz Savani is its group managing director.

A lender under capital pressure

The takeover comes as Kenya forces its banks to hold far more capital. A 2024 change to banking law raised the minimum core capital a lender must hold from 1 billion shillings to 3 billion shillings by the end of 2025, rising in steps to 10 billion shillings ($77 million) by 2029. The next threshold, 5 billion shillings ($38.5 million), takes effect at the end of this year.

ABC Bank's shareholders put 1.2 billion shillings ($9.2 million) into the bank through a rights issue early this year to meet the first deadline. The offer, which initially sought 400 million shillings, was oversubscribed and lifted the bank's core capital to 3.9 billion shillings ($30 million), still short of the level it must reach by December.

Smaller lenders across the country have been raising money from existing owners, finding new investors or looking at mergers to meet the rules. Four banks had failed to reach the 3 billion-shilling minimum by the end of March.

From clinics to banking

Saini built his fortune in private healthcare. He is chairman of Bliss Healthcare, which he founded in 2012 and which runs more than 80 outpatient medical centres across Kenya, and founder of Lifecare Hospitals, a hospital chain started in 2017 that has grown into one of the country's fastest-expanding healthcare providers. He also owns Dilnas Pharma, a drug distributor. His father, Umesh Saini, founded Nairobi West Hospital in the 1980s.

Bliss Healthcare has for years been a main provider of care under the medical schemes that cover Kenya's teachers, police officers and prison staff.

That business has also drawn scrutiny. Nelson Amenya, a Kenyan whistleblower living in France, accused Saini in posts on X of being among people who benefited from contracts linked to Kenya's move from the National Hospital Insurance Fund to the new Social Health Authority. Saini rejected the claims and sued Amenya for defamation in Paris, seeking 60,000 euros in damages and costs.

The Paris court dismissed the case, ruling that the posts concerned matters of public interest in Kenya and that Saini had not shown harm in France. It ordered him to pay 5,000 euros toward Amenya's legal costs. Saini also filed a separate defamation case against Amenya in Nairobi.

The central bank's review will decide whether Saini can add a licensed lender to his group. Kenyan regulators have approved several bank takeovers in the past two years as the capital rules pushed smaller lenders toward new owners, including the purchase of National Bank of Kenya by Nigeria's Access Bank and Zenith Bank's buyout of Paramount Bank.