TWO MAIN banks at Nkawkaw, the Ghana Commercial Bank (GCB) and the Agricultural Development Bank (ADB), have been hit by scandals within one week, bringing the security system at the country’s banks into serious question. Even though some arrests have been made, worried observers continue to wonder how such incidents could happen at such renowned banks as the GCB and ADB.

In the GCB episode, which happened on December 4, this year, a customer called Micheal Mensah went to deposit an amount of ¢17.3 million. On reaching the banking hall, a cashier was said to have asked him to send the money inside to be counted by other cashiers since the first cashier had two many customers to attend to.

According to Mensah, when he entered the bank’s secretary’s office, which leads to where the counting cashiers were, a gentleman neatly dressed with a neck tie to match and looking like a bank staff tapped his shoulder, offering to assist him by counting the money for him quickly.

When Mensah was about to reach the counter, the supposed bank staff asked him to buy him food outside whilst the money was left at the banking hall chambers in his (supposed staff) care. When Mensah returned with the food, the ‘staff’ was no where to be found; neither had he left the money with the counters. Mensah’s enquiries with the bank secretary and other staff led him to the grim conclusion that the man was not at all a staff member, not known by any member of staff. The bank workers had rather supposed the thief to be accompanying Mensah to transact business at the bank.

When the bank manager, Emmanuel L. Baffoe, was contacted, he confirmed the story but said they could not accept any responsibility and that they were not sure if Mensah was sent by someone to deposit the money on his behalf. He, however, described the incident as unfortunate and promised to put the necessary measures in place to avoid its reoccurrence.

In the one involving the ADB, thieves managed to outwit its security on the night of Monday, December 11, to enter the bank’s strong room and nearly packed out all the money stored in the room. They, however, managed to take away ¢17.5 million according to the charge sheet presented at the Nkawkaw Magistrate Court sighted by The Heritage.

The stealing was detected the next morning when a worker went to the strong room to pick some documents. The two persons who appeared in court on Wednesday, December 13, on charges of unlawful entry and stealing were Kwabena Amoah Asare and Kofi Opoku a.k.a Nana Yaw. Their pleas were not taken and the facts of the case were also not given.

A source close to the bank told The Heritage that, on the night of Monday, December 11 this year, there was a blackout in the Nkawkaw township so the bank initially switched on its electricity generator for sometime. The source said the thieves took advantage of the darkness to destroy a piece of metal covering one of the windows at the back of the building and entered the strong room. One of them, Amoah, could not leave the premises till the next morning so he hid himself to wait for another night.

In the morning, the staff detected that a sack containing a certain customer’s money which he left in the care of the bank the previous day to be counted later had been tampered with. In the course of cross-checking to ascertain what actually happened, they saw somebody who later identified himself as Kwabena Amoah Asare, hiding in an empty 21 inch colour television carton under a table.

According to the source, Asare allegedly mentioned Opoku and two other persons now on the run as his accomplices. When the branch manager, Ofori Yentumi, was contacted he declined to comment, insisting he had been warned by his bosses not to comment on the matter. When The Heritage asked him to direct the paper to who could comment on the matter, the manager said no one in the bank was prepared to talk to the press on the issue since it was still under investigation.

This paper was also informed by another source that Amoah was a brother-in-law to one of the cleaners at the bank and was allowed by the bank authorities to enter the premises to assist his in-law in his duties on many occasions, a situation security experts described as a serious security flaw. The Heritage is also investigating alleged lapses on some aspects of the banks’ operations which could create problems in the future. The police have confirmed the two incidents and said investigations are on going.