Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has taken former President John Mahama on again over his unabated criticism of the Akufo-Addo government’s handling of the challenges in the banking sector.
Speaking during the launch of a landmark affordable housing project in Amasaman, a suburb of Accra Wednesday, Dr. Bawumia urged Mahama to desist from commenting on the banking sector crisis being solved by the Akufo-Addo administration after spearheading the “degeneration of the sector”.
“The banking crisis developed under your watch yet nothing was done,” Bawumia said.
According to Bawumia, the government has saved 4.6million depositors “in the interest of financial stability and national security.”
In a response to Mahama’s declaration that he would restore the indigenous stake in the banking sector in a future NDC government, Bawumia quizzed: “Where was your concern for indigenous firms during 4 years of dumsor?”
Mahama berated the Akufo-Addo government in a Facebook live address for taking a chaotic approach in the banking sector clean up.
According to him, he had already set up a policy working group on finance and economy to study and analyse “the situation with a view to coming up with pragmatic steps that we can employ, not only to restore the confidence of our people in the banking system, but also ameliorate the suffering imposed on the customers and staff of these financial institutions caused by the poor handling of the crisis by this administration.”
“The group will also come up with plans for restoring the indigenous stake and participation in this all-important sector. We will consider ways to promote greater financial inclusion and innovation, and will consider setting up an appropriate vehicle to regulate microfinance and allied sectors in particular while developing the rural banking system and enhancing the role of the ARB-APEX Bank’s supervisory structure,” he said.
The government’s cleanup of the Banking Sector had resulted in the collapse of seven indigenous banks including, Sovereign bank, Beige bank, Royal Bank, Construction Bank, uniBank, Capital bank, and UT bank have collapsed since 2017.
Five of the above banks were earlier this year merged under the name Consolidated Bank of Ghana.
The government says the collapse of the seven banks cost it an amount of GH¢9.9 billion and its intervention saved deposits of some GH¢11.0 billion.
The Bank of Ghana on Friday, 16th August 2019, also revoked the licenses of 23 savings and loans companies.