It has emerged that owners of the now defunct Heritage Bank Limited used suspicious funds to establish the financial institution in October 2016.
Governor of the Bank of Ghana Dr. Ernest Addison in announcing the collapse of the bank following the revocation of its operating license on Friday said the “bank’s capital appears to have come from sources which are suspicious”.
BoG collapses Heritage Bank; hands assets and liabilities to Consolidated Bank
According to BoG, the 120.6 million cedis provided by Mr. Seidu Agongo as capital for the establishment of the bank appear to have been derived from contracts awarded to him by COCOBOD and are currently the basis of criminal prosecution in the High Court of Ghana.
Read the full grounds given by BoG in revoking the license of Heritage Bank Friday
Heritage Bank Limited (Heritage) was incorporated on 31 January 2014 and was licensed by the Bank of Ghana as a universal bank on 4 October 2016. The promoters/shareholders of the bank were specified as Mr. Seidu Agongo, Ms. Fatima Adamu, Sarago Limited, and Mr. Sylvanus Kotey who together purportedly met the minimum paid-up capital of GHC 120 million.
As part of its efforts to clean up the banking sector, the Bank of Ghana has recently examined the affairs of Heritage and discovered a number of anomalies relating to its licensing, the sources of its capital, and related party transactions.
