Good afternoon! I am writing to you directly but I would also put it in the public domain because I am not the only one in this situation. I have put both my monthly pension payments and part of my bulk pension payment into your GN Bank and Gold Coast Securities.
In both October and November, 2018, even getting my monthly pension was a problem until I opened an account at another bank. Even then, the balance in my account at GN Bank was paid me at GHS 500.00 a week until they just stopped paying. I had to leave a check with the Manager and be called a week later to collect the money.
I still have a balance in my GN Account which I cannot get. My Village Development Committee has also put their “small money” into the Gold Coast Securities and cannot access it for emergencies.
People put their money in your business because they had trust in you because they saw you as a successful businessman and also felt that your desire to become a President of Ghana would not make you cheat them. We were blind to how you and some of your staff were involved in the 2016 elections, being a threat to the big parties in some constituencies.
In any case, Economics basically has to do with supply and demand and so you offered a good price and people responded by putting their savings, pensions, and even salaries into your GN Bank and Gold Coast Securities.
All the same, as a businessman and politician, you knew very well the risks involved in what you were doing – politics and business – and that either of them could fail.
As such, I believe you would have put in place measures to secure our investments and yours as well just in case the unexpected happened. I, therefore, do not expect you to subject ordinary Ghanaians to the suffering that you are putting us through.
What has angered me most and made me to pen this to you is the experience of a friend. He went to your NEW Gold Coast Fund Management headquarters to ask for a part of his investment and he was given a form to complete indicating that he had an emergency for which he needed the money.
The most annoying requirements were:
1. What is the emergency that is making you ask for this money?
2. Can you provide supporting documents to prove the emergency?
3. Attach supporting documents in respect of the emergency.
HIS MONEY! AN AUDIT? I say annoying because the person wanted just part of his OWN MONEY that he put into your Gold Coast Securities. You can pay back part of our investments if you are a man of integrity and a religious person. You have properties spread across the country, which you can use to guarantee loans and overdrafts or even dispose off to save the poor people from undue hardships.
There are also certain actions you have taken recently that do not show that you cannot pay some of the monies you owe us, For example;
1. You have tried to delink yourself from the bank and the Fund management companies but it is public that you are the owner of these “companies” and with the beneficial ownership register about to be produced, I am tempted to say that “you can run but you cannot hide”
2. You have moved your banks and other offices away from your other properties to new locations at a cost (rent) to ensure that they don’t get attacked by aggrieved customers
3. You have hired foreign consultants at a cost to help continue to deprive us of our money
4. You have continued to maintain your staff who sit at the offices giving excuses and getting themselves embarrassed.
Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom, you don’t need to ask people to justify emergencies before you pay them part of their investments. If you have some money to pay us, you need to come out with a criterion and an agenda to pay the money, such as:
1. Pay those who need to make withdrawals from their GN Bank accounts, especially locked up salaries and pension payments as they are most needed; OR
2. Pay off those with investment below GHS 10,000.00 first in order to reduce the numbers of people you owe and as they are easier to handle; OR
3. Pay a percentage of every investor’s investment so as to be fair to all and sundry; OR,
4. Pay those who invested longest with your Gold Coast Securities as they have been loyal all this while; OR
5. Pay the latest investors first as they have not benefited much from their investments.
You can arrange them anyway you want but let us know how you plan to do it without asking for proof of emergency and give timelines or milestones. I mean, something reasonable without making yourself a “tin god” to determine whether an emergency makes sense or not and which can be proved before you pay.
Of course, you are not the only one to blame. It may be true that the NPP government has decided to pull you down but in pulling you down, they have also pulled many Ghanaians down. For that, GHANAIANS ARE WAITING TO SHOW THEM IN 2020! They should learn from the Diamond and DK cases.
The NPP government found it necessary to close some banks and merge them into the Consolidated bank to operate. I am an illiterate in the area and so I don’t know what happens to the investment of the original owners of these banks.
The government has even found it necessary to mobilize funds for other banks without considering those who have deposits with these old banks.
These supported banks are going after debtors but the government does not find it necessary to also provide funds to pay back those that the banks and investment companies owe.
For this, the NPP may regret when people vote with their feet come 2020. BUT, DR. PAA KWESI NDUOM, WE NEED OUR MONEY.
The post Vitus Azeem writes: Open letter to Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom: GN bank and Gold Coast securities appeared first on Citi Newsroom.
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