The Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) and the Ghana Police Service, have apprehended five companies which presented forged documents as part of moves to register their companies.
Even though a statement from the centre copied to Citi Business News did not mention the companies, it explained that the cases involved Falsification of Registrar General’s documents, and forgery of GIPC Certificates; as well as Forged Bank of Ghana foreign equity confirmation letters.
According to the statement, the forgery of the Registrar General’s Department documents and GIPC Certificates, involved two companies.
One is currently being prosecuted by the GIPC in Court while the second company is being investigated by the Police.
On the submission of forged Bank of Ghana equity confirmation letters, the statement pointed out that the three companies involved mentioned in their caution statements to the Police that a staff member of the GIPC assisted them in preparing the documents for submission.
The said staff member has been invited by the Police and is assisting with the investigations.
Meanwhile, two of the companies involved in the forged Bank of Ghana equity confirmation letters are also among four Companies which have cases pending before the Court for failure to register with the GIPC.
On December 14, 2017, the CEO of the GIPC, Yofi Grant disclosed to Citi Business News that such activities affected FDI in the country.
“There are a number of them in court already and just last week we discovered two more cases of false documentation and so we are working assiduously to clamp down on all these things. We are also making sure that our monitoring team is a bit more aggressive and making sure that we go through all the shops to make sure that people are properly registered and properly engaged to do business here,” he said.
Mr. Grant lamented that the development if unchecked, could negatively impact plans to reposition Ghana as the most attractive investment destination.
“This is a very friendly business environment and it doesn’t mean that people should take advantage of it and abuse it. We are in a country that upholds the rule of law and we need to make sure it works,” he added.
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By: Lawrence Segbefia/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
