Some embattled customers of CIG Microfinance Limited have appealed to government to transfer their locked up monies to ADB, following the Bank of Ghana’s decision to revoke the microfinance company’s license.
According to the distressed customers, the initial decision of government was to transfer funds to a receiver to pay customers who validated their claims, while the Bank of Ghana salvaged the situation.
However, all attempts to lay claim to their monies have proved futile, indirectly affecting their business dealings.
Some of the customers who spoke to Net2 TV appealed to the government to transfer the locked up monies of customers to other financial institutions of good standing to enable them withdraw their monies in order to bring life to their declining businesses.
In June this year, the Bank of Ghana (BoG) revoked the operating licenses of over 300 microfinance institutions.
A statement from the BoG stated that 192 microfinance companies that had their licenses revoked were insolvent and another 155 were revoked because they have ceased operations.
These actions were taken pursuant to section 123 (1) of the Banks and Specialised Deposit-Taking Institutions Act, 2016 (Act 930), the statement explained.
The Banks and Specialised Deposit-Taking Institutions Act requires the BoG to revoke the licence of a bank or Specialised Deposit-taking Institution (SDI) where the Bank of Ghana determines that the institution is insolvent or is likely to become insolvent within the next 60 days.
“Consequently, the Bank of Ghana has appointed Mr. Eric Nipah as Receiver for the specified institutions in line with section 123 (2) of Act 930,” according to the BoG statement.
According to the statement, “The revocation of the licenses of these institutions is to get rid of insolvent and dormant institutions that have no reasonable prospects of rehabilitation and have denied depositors access to their deposits, thereby constituting a threat to the stability of the financial system. By the revocation of these licences, the Bank of Ghana seeks to protect the stability of the financial system and to protect affected depositors.”
The statement said to salvage depositors’ funds, the government had made funds available to enable the Receiver pay depositors after their claims were validated.
In line with the hierarchy of creditor claims set out under Act 930, other creditors of the failed institutions would be settled by the Receiver upon the validation of their claims and to the extent that the Receiver was able to realise value from the remaining assets of those institutions, the statement added.