Debt Exchange Programme is a worry to some banks - Yaw Asante

A section of banks has stated that the debt exchange programme announced by the government has some issues that they have been addressing.

The Managing Director of FBN Bank Ghana, Victor Yaw Asante, stated that the banks have been engaging the government and other stakeholders on some of the modalities of the programme.

According to him, the programme poses several challenges to their businesses and also the private sector.

He however assured that the general public, as well as customers, will be updated as and when any new development occurs.

“We’ve been engaging all players. This includes the government because they are rolling it and whatever they do has implications for us and our regulators. There has been a lot of engagement since the announcement was made,” he is quoted by myjoyonline.

“We wait and see. We are now going to bake in all the changes and see how it pans out. The debt exchange programme has many problems. There are liquidity issues,” he added.

Yaw Asante however added that the debt exchange programme also poses liquidity challenges to banks.

“Banks are now worried that we may not have liquidity. We are engaging our regulator about how we will manage the liquidity and see how we can have a forbearance around some of the requirements of the regular bank or else it will affect us,” he added.

On debt forgiveness, however, Yaw Asante intimated that even though it would be relieving to get debt forgiveness, Ghana must make sure to find good ways to solve its debt issues.

“We owe money. If your debtor forgives you, thank God for it. But for now, we are in a serious position because we are not generating as much as we should generate in terms of debt service and we all know what happened at the beginning of the year, our debt went up, revenue didn’t come as we thought, so it’s good if we get the cancellation,” he said.

SSD/FNOQ