Parliament Won't Probe Directors Of Collapsed Banks

Parliament’s Finance Committee will on Wednesday begin its probe into the collapse of seven indigenous banks in the country.

The Chair of the Committee, Dr Asibey Yeboah said they have agreed not to invite the directors of the closed banks.

According to him, representatives from the Central Bank, the Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited, KPMG, PriceWaterhouseCoopers and the Finance Ministry are scheduled to appear before them and will answer questions on the issue.

“We have made it clear from the onset that we are inviting the institutions to have an in-camera hearing to garner first-hand information from them,” he said.

The Finance Committee of Parliament is set to open a full probe into the circumstances leading to the collapse of seven indigenous banks since 2017.

In August 2017, UT Bank and Capital Bank went down and all their assets and liabilities were taken over by state-owned GCB Bank.

A year later, the Central Bank has created The Consolidated Bank of Ghana to take over the assets of Sovereign Bank, Construction Bank, BEIGE Bank, The Royal Bank and uniBank after they all ran into liquidity problems.

He explained further they will be meeting with the Bank of Ghana because it closed down the seven banks and Finance Ministry because they voted money to capitalize the newly created Consolidated Bank as well as issued a bond of ¢8 billion.

“These are issues that we have to interrogate and get first-hand information from these institutions. I don’t know about executive directors…on what basis…on media accounts or what?” he quizzed.

But Banking Consultant, Dr Richard Atuahene who had consistently argued that the directors of the various boards of the closed banks must be made to answer for their stewardship disagrees.

“I don’t know what they want to achieve and their set of objectives for the meeting but if they want to know the inside out of the issue, everyone must be made to tell their side of their story,” he said.

He believes it will give the public the opportunity to know what went on and everyone will get the chance to clear their chest.