During the 2016 general elections which was characterized by political accusations and counter accusation on state of Ghana’s economy, the then Vice Presidential Candidate Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, a well know economist and former Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana at a lecture on the topic the “State of the Ghanaian Economy: A Foundation of Concrete or Straw?” indicated that about 8 banks are distressed:
“BANKING SECTOR FRAGILITY
Mr. Chairman, as Ghana’s economy has declined under John Mahama’s NDC government, so has the financial sector become increasingly fragile and vulnerable. Specifically:
- Bad loans in the banking sector have risen significantly. Economic and Financial data from the Central Bank, show that non-performing loans have risen sharply from 11.2% in May 2015 to a critically high 19.3% in May 2016. For example, the level of impaired loans in one of the largest Commercial banks, have quadrupled and the situation is becoming widespread in the banking sector. Available information shows that due to non-payment of these loans, the banks have declared GH¢2.4 billion of the outstanding stock of loans as a complete loss and are making 27 provisions against profits. Certainly these are resources that could be channeled to create more industries in our communities.
- The Asset Quality Review of Banks conducted in 2015 shows significant vulnerability of banks to current economic conditions, and that if the affected banks were to provision fully for all bad loans, a significant number of them would collapse. Eight (8) banks were identified to exhibit significant weaknesses, with capital adequacy ratios below 10% (some below 5%) and nearing collapse.”
Here we come today, the Central Bank has announced that both UT Bank and Capital Bank – home grown banks have to be taken over by GCB Bank.
Now if this is what Dr. Bawumia predicted, what did he do about the situation to save these local banks since he became the Vice President of the Republic for more than 7 months now? Or were those alarms only meant to show how weak our economy was under the John Mahama administration? Did we not provide solutions when we see problems?
Also, if these directors of these bank knew this, what was their efforts in resolving the issues?
What are the names of the other banks? what are their directors and government doing to save the situation?
We need solutions to survive as human beings!