How BBC reported the effects of BoG license revocations on Ghanaians

Some market women in Ghana have expressed disappointment in their various banking institutions facing revocation of license and insolvency from the Bank of Ghana.

According to the aggrieved customers of some of the 23 embattled savings and loans companies in the country, the inability of them accessing their investments to boost their businesses is really frustrating though there has been an assurance from their firms to refund their monies very soon.

One of the women who spoke to Focus on Africa said, “now that they’ve promised to pay, it should be done quickly. I hustle under this scorching sun to make money and it’s not easy. I don’t think I’ll invest in any financial institutions again”.

Another said, “I am happy they’ve asked us to come and fill in some forms so we can get our monies back. I’m hoping they pay the money because I want to invest it in my business”.

On May 31, 2019, BoG revoked the licenses of 347 institutions and 39 microcredit institutions operating in the country. Some of these affected banks resorted to merging hence, the functioning of the Consolidated Bank Ghana limited.

So far, a total of 420 financial institutions have been insolvent and have had their licenses revoked.

With this banking sector cleanup, about 70,000 customers of various defunct banks, savings and loans companies have been affected, meanwhile, an amount of 14 billion cedis have been borrowed by the Government of Ghana to help settle depositors and investors.

BoG in a statement explained that the actions “were taken in pursuant to Section 123 (1) of the Banks and Specialised Deposit-Taking Institutions Act, 2016 (Act 930), which requires the Bank of Ghana to revoke the licence of a Bank or Specialised Deposit-Taking Institution (SDI) where the Bank of Ghana determines that the institution is insolvent. The Bank of Ghana has also appointed Mr Eric Nipah as a Receiver for the specified institutions in line with section 123 (2) of Act 930.”

However, the Bank of Ghana will on September 2019 launch Ghana Protection Scheme to strengthen protection of depositors’ interest.