Gold Coast Fund customers appeal to Akufo-Addo

The Coalition of Aggrieved customers of Gold Coast Fund Management on Monday appealed to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to guarantee full payment of their locked up investments.

President Akufo-Addo in 2019 directed the Ministry of Finance to work with the Bank of Ghana to ensure a 100 per cent payment of depositors of failed banks, microfinance, and savings and loan companies whose licenses were revoked.

The aggrieved customers said the capped amount of GH¢10,000.00 to GH¢20,000.00 as proposed by the Ministry of Finance for customers of locked up funds was unacceptable considering the different levels of individual investments, which ranged from GH¢50,000.00 to over GH¢40 million.

“We consider the rational for the capped amount by government as improper since it does not address the urgent needs of all the various categories of investors, but rather will worsen the already deplorable plight of majority of the customers,” the Coalition stated.

Mr Charles Nyame, the Public Relations Officer for the Coalition made the appeal at a News briefing in Accra and urged government to arrange a meeting between the Ministry of Finance, the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the leadership of the customers to deliberate on the best possible solution for payment of their investments.

It also called on SEC to ensure acknowledgement receipts of validation to all customers who took part in the validation process since majority of its members had not received receipts of validation.

SEC in November 2019 in a statement asked customers of the collapsed fund management firms to visit CBG branches to validate their documents in order to receive payments.

The statement said customers would receive text messages showing them the processes to receive their monies once their documents were validated.

Mr Nyame said the Coalition would embarked on a demonstration if government failed to heed to their demands, calling on all customers of other defunct fund management companies to join them to retrieve their monies.

Some of the aggrieved customers, expressed worry about the delay in retrieving their monies, calling on government to expedite action to avoid any untoward situation.

Madam Joyce Yeboah said she had her savings locked locked up, which affected her plans and now found it difficult to meet her business obligations.

Mr Richmond Adjetey appealed to government to facilitate the processes to enable them retrieve their monies since the situation led to the death of some customers, while others suffered various kinds of illnesses.

The Bank of Ghana clean-up was followed by the shutdown of some 386 microfinance and money lending institutions.

Subsequently, 23 non-bank financial institutions made up of savings and loans companies and finance houses had their licenses also revoked over several regulatory breaches including; the inability to pay customers’ deposits.