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Members of the Aggrieved Customers of Gold Coast Fund Management with a membership of over fifty-five thousand (55,000) unpaid customers of Black shield Capital Limited, hitherto known as; Gold Coast Fund Management (GCFM) owned by Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom, have threatened to sue the government over their locked up funds.
The group said it has been over four (4) years since our investments got locked up with GCFM which is a government-regulated institution under the Asset Management Sector regulated by Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC).
“The lock-up of our investments was mainly due to the Government’s policy of a Financial Sector Clean-up Exercise in Ghana initiated in 2018,” the said in a statement.
They stated that affected depositors of other Fund Management Companies have been bailed out long ago and it is most unfortunate that the government is discriminating against us.
“This discriminatory act on the part of the government is in contravention of the 1992 Constitution that requires the government to treat all its nationals equally without discrimination.
“Government taking over the debt and validating customers claims with an initial payment of Ghs 50,000 per each investment makes the government liable to the customers on the grounds of absorption of responsibility. Affected depositors would have taken action to retrieve their deposit since 2018 but for the government taking over the responsibility to pay us.
“It had been the case of Group Nduom that government owes them and the evidence available clearly confirms same. There can be a set off in the absence of malice to give relief to us. It is however unfortunate that we the ordinary citizens are now made to bear the brunt of a government decision for the past four years in such a dastardly manner. You can imagine how we have been surviving for all these years, especially, the pensioners and sick persons among us.
“Pensioners among us who have their investment locked up till date, form more than 70% of our membership and it is incomprehensible that government would shield its responsibility with a condition of securing an order from the court before it pays these dying pensioners.”
They added “Following the brief background enumerated in the previous paragraphs, we would like to humbly petition the media which is the fourth estate of realm as follows; A parliamentary approved bailout package as we all know is distinct from a liquidation order being sought in the court. Therefore we plead the media to treat our plight with a sense of public interest and recommend to the government to proceed to commit the Ghs 5.5 billion budget allocation made in the 2021 budget for payment of Fund Management Customers to pay us.
The initial forensic audit conducted by the government on the Financial Sector before the introduction of the Financial Clean-up Exercise policy puts the debt in the Financial Sector to Nine Billion Ghana CEDIS (GHS 9,000,000,000.00). Now, a document available from the Finance Ministry shows that amount of money committed to payment of victims of the clean-up to date sums up to Twenty-five Billon Ghana Cedis (GHS 25,000,000,000.00).
“We respectfully plead the media to interrogate and request the Finance Minister to
explain how he arrived at spending an amount of GHS 25,000,000,000.00 to settle a debt of GHS9,000,000,000.00 and yet, the Aggrieved Customers Of Gold Coast Fund Management have not received full payment of our investments.
“Finally, we wish to assure the general public that, we are ready to go to court to seek redress of this matter.”
