Let’s strictly adhere to good corporate governance- Prof. Abotsi

Dean of UPSA Law School Prof. Kofi Abotsi has called on banking industry players and managers of financial institutions to strictly adhere to good corporate governance in order to escape risky dealings in the country.

Prof. Kofi Abotsi, Dean of UPSA Law School, Accra-Ghana

Gertrude Amorkor Amarh, Coordinator of UPSA Quarterly Banking Round-table & Lecturer UPSA Law School.

The latest call by Prof. Abotsi comes at the period Ghana’s banking industry has been hard-hit by crisis leading to the collapse of many financial institutions with negative impacts to the national economy coupled with job losses, panic withdrawals, locked-up of depositor’s funds, savings, investments, collapsed of businesses and dwindling investor confidence.

Licences of 9 commercial banks, 2 finance houses, 386 microfinance and micro credits companies, 53 fund managers, 23 savings and loans firms were revoked as part of the banking sector clean-up exercise due to breaches of Act 930, severe impairments of their capital and inability to meet the regulator’s new minimum capital of four hundred million Cedis (GHC 400m).

According to Prof. Abotsi, the inability of institutions to strictly enforce good corporate governance and lack of well- established structures partly accounted for the banking crisis.

Speaking at UPSA Quarterly Banking Roundtable on corporate governance and risky dealings in banks on Thursday July 15, monitored by African Editors, the Constitutional Law Expert Prof. Abotsi said “Experiences Ghana has had within the last three years has demonstrated the importance of corporate governance. clearly, when a bank collapses, it has impacts on the entire country, this is because banks are inextricably in tandem with the economy of a country. The above has therefore necessitated the need to discuss corporate governance and risky dealings”.

The reports on revocation of the banks shows disregard for corporate governance and the use of the customers’ funds for operational activities, a risky dealing.

Contributing to the discussion, the Coordinator of the Quarterly Banking Roundtable and a Lecturer at UPSA Law School Madam Gertrude Amorkor Amarh said “In less than a year, the QBR has become the number one and the most trusted platform for deconstructing pertinent issues affecting the banking sector in Ghana to proffer solutions”.

The 2021 UPSA Quarterly Banking Roundtable which focused on Corporate Governance and Risky Dealings in Banks, was sponsored by Absa Ghana with supports from Joy 99.7, Asaase Radio and Africa Editors/africaneditors.com (Global Voice of Africa)

Source: africaneditors.com