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Pensioners who purchased bonds from the government but have yet to receive their coupons have vowed to protest the ministry of finance once more if they are not paid within 48 hours.
“We have our choices, plenty of them, including the picketing, so, when it comes that we have to repeat, we’ll repeat”, the group’s convener Dr Adu Anane Antwi told media.
Dr. Anane Antwi responding to question from the media indicated that they will not go to court but rather go back to the ministry to picket as they did earlier, “No, we won’t go to court; we don’t have time to go to court”.
Former Chief Justice Sophia Akuffo, who attended previous picketings twice during the domestic debt restructuring program, is a notable member of that group.
The government has not honored matured bonds for the third time, as pledged by the finance minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, on February 15th, 2023, to the dismay of a number of individual creditors.
The minister reaffirmed the government’s pledge to paying these creditors who chose not to participate in the domestic debt exchange program that their coupons would be paid to them following two prior missed deadlines.
The government’s failure to pay the members on the due date of Monday, March 13, 2023, has angered the members.
The Coalition claims that despite written news statements stating that payments would resume on March 13, 2023, Individual Bondholders who chose not to participate in the Voluntary Domestic Debt Exchange Program (DDEP) are still owed their coupon and principal payments.
“The little confidence remaining in the markets as a result of assurances from the Ministry of Finance is fading away under the full watch of the very institutions set up to protect it. Individual Bondholders, as was the case in the aftermath of the DDEP announcement, have been left to fight for themselves as the Government creates a full default on its obligations. Fight we will,” the group stated in a statement released on March 14, 2023.
They also gave the government 48-hour ultimatum to honour its word by paying all matured principals and coupouns.
“We are giving a 48-hour ultimatum to the Ministry of Finance to honour its word to pay all matured principal and outstanding coupons due on the existing bonds issued by the Government of Ghana. We call on the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Ghana Stock Exchange to enforce the rules of full disclosure required by all issuers including the Government of Ghana”
Read the full statement below:
Source: Ghanatodayonline.com
