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Former General Secretary of the Christian Council of Ghana, Rev. Dr. Kwabena Opuni Frimpong has called for the enactment of laws to regulate the activities of churches in the country.

He says it will assist government to curb some of the activities of churches that seem to bother government.

The depreciation of the Ghana cedi against its major trading currencies is being blamed, at least in part, on churches and how they manage their finances.

A Senior Economic Advisor to the Vice-president of Ghana, Dr. Samuel Kwadwo Frimpong, is blaming the cedi's current weakness against major trading currencies, at least in part, on the financial decisions by churches in Ghana.

Dr Frimpong, in a report has alleged that most churches in Ghana convert their income (from religious offertories) into dollars, and then transfer the dollar value amounts into foreign exchange accounts.

“Many churches in Ghana do not have their head offices here. So their collections, offerings and tithes are changed into dollars and transferred into forex accounts."

“Recently, we have studied and noticed that on Mondays and Tuesdays, the rate at which the cedi is changed into dollars rises. As a Christian and an economist, I think it is also a contributory factor," he said.

But speaking in an interview with Peace FM news about the activities of some churches in the country which seem to be a contributing factor to the current depreciating of the cedi, Rev. Dr. Kwabena Opuni Frimpong blamed it on the lack of laws to regulate churches especially those with foreign branches.

He said they will conduct a personal research into these findings, and also believes there should be laws to regulate them.

"The depreciation of the cedi is a source of worry to all of us because these churches who are into this business of doing foreign exchange business after Sundays are developing their countries with the monies they get from here.

"Ghanaians should learn to report these churches who are engaged in this activities because they are crippling our economy,"he said.

Government should in the mean time engage the leaders of the various Christian bodies and enact laws that will regulate their activities before it gets out of hand, he added