Capital Bank Case: Fitzgerald Odonkor And Tetteh Nettey Discharged
Two individuals standing trial together with the founder of Capital Bank, William Ato Essien, have been acquitted and discharged.
The duo, Rev. Fitzgerald Odonkor and Tetteh Nettey, were on trial with Mr Essien for their individual roles in the collapse of Capital Bank.
Together, they were charged with 23 counts of conspiracy and stealing from the GH¢620 million liquidity support given to Capital Bank by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to enable it to service its maturing debts.
The accused persons, according to the prosecution, opened various bank accounts with Capital Bank through which the GH¢620 million BoG liquidity support was transferred while others were carried in jute bags to Mr Essien.
However, after four years of trial, the two accused persons have been freed of all court hurdles.
The court found the two not guilty of six and seven charges, respectively.
In April this year, Rev. Odonkor, in his evidence, revealed that he was against the bank’s payment of GH¢27.5 million as a business promotion to its founder and Chief Executive Officer, William Ato Essien.
He further said although the decision of the bank’s board to pay Mr Essien out of the GH¢620 million Bank of Ghana utility support was an industry practice, he and some other members protested against such practice.
Businessman Dr Tetteh Nettey on his part, also alleged during his trial that officials of the collapsed bank coerced him to sign certain documents when the officials were invited by the Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC).
This was when regulators commenced investigations into the operations of the financial institutions.
He explained that he refused to sign the documents, only to see the same documents during his trial with his signature.
Meanwhile, the first accused person William Ato Essien has been ordered to pay the GH¢90 he owes the state.
Background
Capital Bank was one of the first banks that collapsed after a massive clean-up of financial institutions by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) starting in 2017.
On August 14, 2017, its licence and UT Bank were revoked by the BoG after the central bank had declared them insolvent.
The central bank allowed the state-owned bank, the GCB Bank, to acquire the two banks to protect depositors’ funds and enable them to stay afloat.
The hurricane that swept through the banking sector due to the collapse of the two banks heightened in August 2018 when the central bank collapsed five other indigenous banks and merged them into one entity — Consolidated Bank, Ghana.