Consolidated Bank to Shutdown 98 branches

The newly-created Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited (CBG) will discontinue 98 of its 191 inherited branches to keep 93, Chairman of Parliament’s Finance Committee, Dr Mark Asibey-Yeboah, has said.

Briefing the media after Day 2 of the committee’s in-camera hearing at which it met with Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited (CBG) officials, Dr. Asibey-Yeboah said although the management of CBG is certain of which branches it will close down, the number of jobs to be lost are yet to be determined.

“We asked the question about the number of jobs they will cut, and they said they are still in the process of rationalising the platform they want to use, and that will determine where they will go. What we had from them was the number of branches they will close down.

“As of now, they have 191, and they have come to the determination that they will keep 93, but beyond that, we do not have the number of jobs that will be lost”, he said.

A banking consultant, Nana Otuo Acheampong, has as well appealed to the public to continue to patronise the services of banks, in spite of the collapse of seven local banks over the last 12 months.

The government of Ghana, since August 2017, has rescued seven struggling local banks with GHS8billion of taxpayers’ money. Meanwhile, It is estimated that about 1,700 staff of CBG will be retrenched.

On August 1st, 2018, the BoG announced its revocation of five banks’ licences – Unibank, Sovereign, Construction, Beige and Royal Banks – and subsequently transferred all deposits, selected assets and liabilities of those banks to a newly-created entity: Consolidated Bank Ghana Limited.

The action follows the withdrawal of banking licences from UT and Capital Banks a year ago, and their subsequent take-over under a purchase and assumption arrangement with GCB.