A former Bank of Ghana chief economist, Dr. A. O Abudu, says criminality on the part of some staff of the central bank is partly to be blamed for the financial mess that has caused seven local banks to collapse.

For him, staff of BoG who failed on their responsibilities in ensuring that the affected banks did the right thing in line with regulations are nothing but criminals.



“Look at even the banking crisis; they were going through shortcuts; including those people who were criminals in the Bank of Ghana…You are told that these are regulations, people must comply, you are sitting there, they are not complying with the regulations, and you are condoning them. You are a criminal,” he said on Sunrise morning show Tuesday.

Seven indigenous banks – UT, Capital, Soverign, Construction, Royal, UniBank and Beige banks – have collapsed within a year, causing approximately 2000 job losses.

Five of the banks, whose licences were revoked by the BoG over liquidity issues, have now been consolidated to form the Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited with the government injecting 450 million cedis into it as a minimum capital.

According to the former BoG chief economist, the failure on the part of some officials of the central bank to do due diligence plunged the banking sector into the mess

He observed that lack of honesty and indiscipline, which he said ar e the traits of some Ghanaians, is causing the country a lot of harm, noting the situation is preventing the country from developing.

“We have to be disciplined; we have to honour discipline, people feel they can have shortcuts,” he noted.

The former chief economist also chastised opinion leaders who plead for persons found culpable of corrupt acts to be let go.

“I think that when some of these chiefs come and intervene, please don’t take him away, these are all part of the criminal gang, you become an accomplice, and if you are an accomplice you are also a criminal,” he said

He also underscored the need for persons found culpable to be dealt with properly, instead of just restricting it to jail terms.

“Your property, everything must be seized. You should not just go and pay. Nobody should hold Ghana hostage,” he said.