NatWest Group PLC on Monday said it has appointed Paul Thwaite as its new chief executive officer, replacing Alison Rose who resigned last week amid the bank’s row with Brexit politician Nigel Farage.

The Edinburgh, Scotland-based lender said Thwaite will serve an initial period of 12 months subject to regulatory approval, effective from Tuesday last week.

NatWest said Thwaite has also been appointed CEO at NatWest Holdings Ltd, The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC and National Westminster Bank PLC, also with effect from Tuesday last week.

Thwaite holds a number of financial services advisory and non-executive roles, NatWest said, and is a member of the Whitehall Industry Group and the UK government’s Business Finance Council. He previously served as a director of Motability Operations Group PLC from September 2016 to March 2021.

In the early hours of Wednesday last week, previous CEO Rose resigned from her position after admitting to being the source of an inaccurate story about Nigel Farage’s finances.

Earlier, Rose said she made a ‘serious error of judgment’ when she discussed Farage’s relationship with private bank Coutts, owned by NatWest Group, with a BBC journalist.

Chair Howard Davies initially said the board members had decided the chief executive retained their ‘full confidence’ but her position became ever more uncertain after the Chancellor and Downing Street were said to have ‘serious concerns’ over her conduct.

An emergency board meeting was called late on Tuesday night to determine her future, with the announcement of her resignation coming a few hours later.

A week earlier, Farage presented evidence, in the form of a 40-page dossier, that his account at Coutts had been closed partly due to his political views conflicting with the bank’s values.

The evidence obtained from the bank through a data request contradicted a BBC News story, which initially claimed that the account closure was motivated by commercial reasons only, citing Farage’s failure to meet a £1 million borrowing requirement.

The BBC and its business editor Simon Jack apologised, saying the reporting had been based on information from a ‘trusted and senior source’ but ‘turned out to be incomplete and inaccurate’.

On Thursday last week, Coutts boss Peter Flavel also stepped down immediately, expected to be replaced by Mohammad Kamal Syed, who is currently the head of asset management at the bank, on an interim basis until a permanent successor is found.

Shares in NatWest closed down 0.5% to 244.30 pence each in London on Monday.

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