ALLIED Irish Banks has resubmitted its bid for a share holding in Polish bank Wielkopolski Bank Kredytowy. This follows the decision by the Polish Ministry of Finance to start a new tender process to sell shares in the bank.

The ministry abandoned the original tender process, which closed on March 11th, and re-advertised the offer of 13,763,200 WBK shares. No reasons were given for the decision to restart the tendering process and it was not possible to contact the ministry yesterday.

The second tender offer, which closed yesterday, allowed potential bidders a further three weeks to make an offer for some or all of the shares, which are being sold in blocks of 5 per cent. The sale would reduce the Polish government's share holding in WBK from 25 per cent to 5 per cent.

Bidders were asked to indicate their offer price, the number of shares they were interested in and their future strategy for the bank.

With a rise in the share price of WBK to over nine zlotys from just over five zlotys since the beginning of the year, the sale will raise over 125 million zlotys (£34 million) for the Polish government.

AIB declined to disclose how many WBK shares it was interested in acquiring. It is understood Bank Inicjatyw Gospodarczych would be among AIB's competitors for WBK shares.

The bank recently received clearance from the National Bank of Poland to bid for WBK.