The Minority National Democratic Congress (NDC) in Parliament has waded into the receivership of the Capital Bank and the Unique Trust (UT) Bank by the Ghana Commercial Bank, calling for bipartisan investigation into the insolvency of the two banks.
The Minority, at a hurriedly arranged press conference yesterday, which was addressed by the ranking member, Cassiel Ato Forson, asked Parliament, through the speaker to summon the Minister of Finance and Governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to brief Members of Parliament (MPs) about the current development in the banking sector and assure Ghanaians, who save with the two banks, that they would not lose their deposits.
The minority, however, lauded the bold decision of the government for the Ghana Commercial Bank (GCB) to take over the two banks.
The ranking member said the Governor of the BoG, Dr Ernest Addison at a press conference on the‘Purchase and Assurances (P&A), assured the nation that the approach has a distinct benefit where customers will suffer no losses, adding that the acquiring bank (GCB) will increase its market share while the productive financial assets of UT Bank and the Capital Bank will be sustained.
He indicated that the transaction could be viewed as a ‘smooth take-over’ rather than the earlier speculated simple and forced liquidation, which would have had a devastating on the economy.
He said the P&A transactions follows other precedent approaches like in the case of the Bank for Housing and Construction and the Bank for Credit and Commerce that had been used to deal with difficult banking situation in the country.
He said he was not surprised at the turn of events, because the previous National Democratic Congress (NDC) while in government had done investigations on capital adequacy ratio of some eight banks and foresaw the development.
He said that unfortunately the Vice President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, who was then the running mate, capitalized on the classified information using his links with the Bank of Ghana to make it public and create panic that eight banks were on the brink of liquidation.
According to the ranking member, now that Vice President is the head of the economic management, he should show that he has the professional ability to bring stability and growth to the banking sector.
He also cautioned the government to ensure that the takeover of the two banks by the GCB does not dwindle the fortunes to the bank, because under the previous New Patriotic Party (NPP), the GCB nearly collapsed.
“The government must tell the people of Ghana what caused the rise and fall of UT Bank and the Capital Bank,” he said, stressing that workers of the two banks must not be given any ‘raw deal.’
By Thomas Fosu Jnr