Dr Kwabena Duffuor and Prince Kofi Amoabeng
Dr Kwabena Duffuor and Prince Kofi Amoabeng have been told to provide further and better particulars to the Committee formed by Parliament to look into the closure of their banks, Unibank and UT.
Speaking to Citi News on the fringes of the inauguration of the new Parliamentary Service Board.
Chairman of the bi-partisan Committee, Joe Osei Owusu (Joewise) told journalists in Accra on Tuesday, April 27 that the two petitioners have one week to make the documents available to the committee.
“The committee met last week and after reading the petition, we decided to call on the petitioners to bring to us all the documents on which they based their petition and request so that the committee will review them and then guide us on the way forward.
“We have not as yet received them. I think we agreed that we will reconvene in two weeks because we said we are allowing them one week to submit and one week for us to study the documents, and then we start our work,” he said.
In their petition, Dr Duffuor and Mr Amoabeng are asking the Committee to “Investigate the conduct of the Bank of Ghana and the Ghana Stock Exchange for the revocation of UT Bank’s licence and delisting the bank without due regard to the rules of Administrative Justice guaranteed under Article 23 of the 1992 Constitution.
“Direct the restoration of the banking licence of UT Bank Limited by the Bank of Ghana and the remedying of the harms done the shareholders’ property rights as a result of the conduct of the Bank of Ghana.”
They also said “Investigate the conduct of the Bank of Ghana in the takeover, appointment of an Official Administrator of uniBank Ghana Limited and the circumstances surrounding the revocation of the banking licence of uniBank Ghana Limited;
“Direct the restoration of the banking licence of uniBank Ghana Limited by the Bank of Ghana and the remedying of the harms done the shareholders’ property rights as a result of the conduct of the Bank of Ghana.”
The Bank of Ghana (BoG) in August 2018 announced that it has revoked the licences of five banks and put them together as Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited.The banks were uniBank Ghana Limited, The Royal Bank Limited, Beige Bank Limited, Sovereign Bank Limited, and Construction Bank Limited and appointed Nii Amanor Dodoo of KPMG as the Receiver for the five banks.
Prior to the amalgamation of the five banks, the Central Bank had closed down UT Bank and Capital Bank in August 2017.
uniBank, according to the BoG, was identified during the Asset Quality Review update in 2016 exercise to be significantly undercapitalised and beyond rehabilitation.
“Shareholders, related and connected parties had taken amounts totaling GH¢3.7 billion which were neither granted through the normal credit delivery process nor reported as part of the bank’s loan portfolio.
“In addition, amounts totalling GH¢1.6 billion had been granted to shareholders, related and connected parties in the form of loans and advances without due process and in breach of relevant provisions of Act 930.
“Altogether, shareholders, related and connected parties of uniBank had taken out an amount of GH¢5.3 billion from the bank, constituting 75 percent of total assets of the bank,” the Central Bank explained back in 2018.
On UT Bank, the Central Bank stated in a press release: “This action has become necessary due to severe impairment of their capital.”