For not making the attempt to rescue the bank early enough, the government must take responsibility for the collapse of Unibank.
That’s the claim by the Minority Spokesperson on Finance Casiel Ato Forson.
In an interview with Joy News hours after the Bank of Ghana announced a major takeover of Unibank, Ato Forson said it is unacceptable that within a period of eight months three locally owned banks had collapsed.
Late last year, UT Bank and Capital Bank were the first on the list of takeovers by the Bank of Ghana after it emerged the indigenous banks had fallen below the minimum capital requirement.
In Parliament on Tuesday, both the Majority and Minority members of the House agreed that government should pursue managers of the two banks and collect the amount of money it would cost the government to manage the collapse.
The government had early on hinted the cost of the insolvency which was put around ¢2 billion was going to be borne by the taxpayer, a decision the MPs kicked against.
Ato Forson in a relentless crusade had kicked against government’s decision and charged managers of the state to pursue the owners of UT Bank and Capital Bank.
However, when the MP was confronted by Evans Mensah on what government had to do in the Unibank case, the Ajumako Enyan Essiam MP said the government had failed. They should have saved the bank, he averred.
“The Central Bank and the government have questions to answer…” he said, adding, “We are ceding the financial sector to foreigners.”
He was convinced Unibank had collapsed and demanded to know who authorized the takeover.
He suspected the takeover was part of a grand IMF plan which government has bought into.
The Bank of Ghana on Tuesday announced the takeover of Unibank with KPMG as the new administrator for the bank.
Governor of the Central Bank Dr Ernest Addison cited a number of challenges, including the concealment of liabilities on the balance sheets of Unibank by managers of the bank.
“UniBank’s problems are part of the legacy issues in the financial sector attributed to weak economic growth and poor corporate governance and risk management practices.
“It will be recalled that UniBank was one of nine banks identified after the asset quality review exercise undertaken in 2016, to be significantly undercapitalized with a CAR of 4.75%,” a statement from the Bank of Ghana said shortly after the official announcement.
KPMG, announced as administrators of the Bank will have six months to manage the bank after which it will revert to an unnamed private organization, the statement said.
Interestingly, the takeover was announced barely a month after Unibank had officially announced a 'takeover' of some majority shares owned by GCB.
But Prof Peter Quartey with the University of Ghana believes the decision taken by the Bank of Ghana is spot on. He said the decision by the Bank of Ghana was a “good action” to ensure “stability and sanity” in the financial sector and added that the repercussions would have been dire if the Bank of Ghana had not taken the action it did.
Source: myjoyonline.com
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It is so sad that these were the people ruling over us no too long ago. They want to make the country ungovernable. Their arguments are without merit. If you fall foul of the law you must be punished.. president deal with them.
"He suspected the takeover was part of a grand IMF plan which government has bought into." Who took us to IMF? The country had weaned itself off the IMF. You and your incompetent NDC came and messed up the economy and ended up running back to the IMF for a bailout. Now you are claiming the government has bought into an IMF plan. What N0ne$ense!
Ato Forson, U are ***barred word*** boy, grow up and stop this ***barred word*** things.
The least said the better. Every Ghanaian now knows the colours that Ato Casel Forson is made of off. Chuff
Another ***barred word***.
How can Ghana progress with such characters in parliament....one fooolïsh mammal who doesn't know anything yet he wants to be relevant!!
Who on earth brought this ignoramus to parliament? Because of people like this i dont want to be a MP - It is a disgrace to sit in the same room with such a person. If NDC is not made of w1tches then i dont know. NDC used Unibank for all their fruadu1ent activities and you are now blaming NPP government for that. In any case i am praying that all busineses owned by NDC members should be collaped.
Look at this pet....always looking for an opportunity to politicize issues...did he read the BoG findings at all..
Why can banks sustain under incompetent, corrupt government
I think that it is also time to blame the current government for NDC's election defeat in 2016.