Abyssinia Bank awards CSCEC to construct its 60 storey building headquarter











After using the 15-storey building (bought at 400 million birr from SACA PLC) for seven years, Bank of Abyssinia had recently announced that its management wants to move the headquarters to a new building. The bank just announced that the construction project of this anticipated new building was awarded to China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC) worth USD 400 million. Being 60 storey high and constructed on 9,763 square meters of land in Mexico – on the road known as ‘the financial district of the city’ – the grandiose building will help the bank upgrade to a higher level.

The announcement of this new project came during the same period when the Bank passed the recently set five billion birr paid-up capital requirement, five years before the deadline.

The project is expected to start in four months, and it is expected to take five years to be completed. According to Bekalu, who was the president of the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) when the state giant awarded the same construction company to construct its 46 storey skyscraper next to Ethiopia Hotel, the addition of this new building will help spur further economic growth.

The observable trend of the country’s biggest banks deciding to move into the city’s biggest buildings seems to be only growing. Awash Bank, the biggest private bank in Ethiopia, is also planning to construct a 50-storey building on its 8,700 square meters of land in Mexico, with an estimated cost of 12 billion birr. It is said to begin construction once approval for its land lease request arrives. A few months back, Nib, too, had completed the construction of its headquarters, built on 3,600 square meters of land at a cost of two billion birr – 400 million birr higher than the original budget.