KOFI ANOKYE OWUSU-DARKO (BLOG2)

  I just read the news in the Business & Financial Times of Monday, January 23, 2023 captioned “COCOBOD default further dampens investor confidence” whereby some banks have debited the accounts of their customers after crediting them with income accrued and realised from Cocoa Bills investments, that is, reversed the credit entries. Also reading a news item on MyJoyOnline, on January 23, 2023 captioned “ Cocoa bills default: BoG, COCOBOD agree to allow banks to use COCOBOD’s deposits to pay retail customers”, it says the Bank of Ghana, initially directed banks not to pay customers their maturing cocoa bills investments, following cash flow challenges facing COCOBOD. If it is true the reversals were done with the directives of the Bank of Ghana, the banks should have “positively” defied that directive. This is so wrong by the laws of banking, banking 101, and no bank can debit the account of a customer to pay a third party or make an investment without mandate and not even the ...

  Section 120 of the National Pensions Act, 2008 mandates that Occupational Pension Schemes, Provident Fund Schemes, Personal Pensions Schemes and other Privately –Managed Pension Schemes are only managed by Trustees licensed by the National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA). Trustees as fiduciaries, owe undivided loyalty to the members of the schemes, the Contributors, and must avoid conflicts of interest unless otherwise authorised by the Contributors after full disclosure. All things being equal, it is the duty of the Trustee to seek the interest of Scheme Members with members, ideally hoping that Trustees with the supervision of the Regulator, National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA), the custodian of the law, will do the right thing. The fact that now Government Securities are not as safe as was envisaged, with the related Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP), every Contributor, Scheme Member, to a privately managed scheme should take personal interest as benef...

  Vision and Mission statements ensure better focus, consistency and unity of purpose. The challenge with the statements I have come across is that they are long and winding, full of words and at times both seem to be saying the same thing. In addition, there is likely to be different versions of the Vision and Mission statements emanating from sources such as the website, annual report and the existing strategic plan of the organisation. Restating or validating an organisation’s Vision and Mission statements should be part of the process to review its Strategic Plan. The need for a restatement is prominent when staff, unless they describe the statements, are not able to recall or communicate both statements readily to guide their dealing with clients, the media, visitors and the general public. I intend to give a guide to what must constitute good Vision and Mission statements, comparing some selected organisations and why the not so good ones would need to be restated. Rest...