The Bank of Ghana (BoG) has denied claims that the First Lady, Mrs Lordina Mahama, has shares in the DKM Microfinance Company.
Owners of the company in Sunyani have not been able to meet their financial obligations to their customers.
At a public forum in Sunyani last Friday to discuss issues affecting microfinance companies in the Brong Ahafo Region, the Head of the Bank Supervision Department of the
BoG, Mr Raymond Amanfu, said the bank did not have any documents on the First Lady as a shareholder of DKM, as was being speculated.
“The name of the First Lady is not in any document available to the BoG; we don’t have anything on her in our documents,” he said.
Forum
The forum was attended by some traditional rulers and customers of the affected companies.
There was a heavy security presence, as the detained directors of some of the companies were brought to the forum and later sent away.
At the forum, most of the questions centred on how the affected customers were going to get their deposits paid to them.
There are rumours in the Brong Ahafo Region that the First Family is behind DKM.
Media encounter
At a media encounter at the Flagstaff House in Accra last Tuesday, President John Mahama dismissed the rumours.
“I don’t know DKM from Adam; my wife doesn’t know DKM from Adam. I only got to see him in the papers after his arrest by the BNI, but yet we are being linked to him.
“...If anybody promises I will give you 50 per cent interest on your money, just know that he’s fooling you,” the President stated.
There have been a series of agitation by customers of some microfinance companies who have been demanding the payment of the deposits they have lodged with the companies.
In the wake of the agitation, the BoG revoked the licences of 70 microfinance companies in the country in order to, among other measures, sanitise the banking system.
