Members of the Minority in Parliament want the House to invite officials of the Bank of Ghana to answer questions on alleged cases of fraud leveled against some Micro-finance companies.
The Minority believe the development has been as a result of a failure by the Bank of Ghana to ensure compliance by the implicated financial institutions,hence their call.
Six individuals including the CEO of DKM Microfinance, Martin Delle were arrested but have since been granted bail for failing to pay customers whose investments running into millions of cedis, have been locked up.
Ranking member of the Finance Committee in Parliament, Dr. Anthony Akoto Osei believes information provided by the central bank will facilitate the process of solving the current situation.
“Once the Minister has made the statement and the House proceeds, we will find that because they are bringing the Insurance and Special Deposit Bill, there will be the need to invite the Bank of Ghana before we even consider the two Bills and I recommend that we invite them before we even consider the two bills,” Dr. Anthony Akoto remarked.
On his part however, Finance Minister, Seth Tekper indicated that the central bank has commenced investigations into the matter.
He further expressed confidence that the passage of the Ghana Deposit Protection Bill and the Banks and Specialized Deposit Taking Institutions’ Bill will help avert the adverse impact of future occurrences, on customers.
“Sections 20 to 22 of the Banks and Specialized Deposit Taking Institutions’ Bill 2015, deals with the problem of unauthorized deposit taking business extensively by outlining the actions to be taken by the Bank of Ghana.This includes the refund of deposits taken by such businesses and penalties for undertaking such unauthorized deposit taking businesses such as imprisonment for a term not less than two years,” Seth Tekper noted.
– By: Pius Amihere Eduku/citibusinessinews.com/Ghana
