Arua central police station is holding five staff of the Post bank over the alleged theft of Shs 138 million. 

The suspects include Leonard Lakwey, the operations manager, Walter Feni, the customer service officer, Resty Lunkuse, David Tenywa, and Brian Olara Okidi, all banking officers at the branch.

They were picked up upon returning to Arua from Post Bank head office in Kampala where they had gone for a disciplinary session over the same matter last week.

Preliminary reports indicate that the money went missing during transit from the Post Bank Arua branch, which is located along Avenue Road in Arua City to Yumbe district.

Josephine Angucia, West Nile region police spokesperson confirmed their arrest, noting that the matter came to the limelight in December last year after a team of officials from Post bank head offices in Kampala visited Arua branch for the end-of-year audit and realized that about Shs 138.6 million was missing.

Angucia says consequently the matter was reported to the police on February 5. According to Angucia, they have preferred a charge of theft of money against the suspects pending advice by the resident state attorney.

In a statement issued on Sunday, police disclosed that the Post Bank Arua branch manager and the branch operations supervisor who are at large evaded arrest after snubbing the disciplinary session at the head office.

This is not the first incident post bank, a government-owned financial institution has faced such challenges. 

In 2019, at least seven former top managers of the bank were accused of fraud totalling about Shs 4 billion but the court later acquitted them of the charges.