Both PPP and APNU+AFC governments failed small depositors

Jan 11, 2023 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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Kaieteur News – Today as with yesterday, I divert from my series of reflections on 2022 because of intervening stories. Today, I look at the criticism government leaders made last week of the private banking industry.

I have a fictional story that I have been including in my analyses and commentaries over a long period of time. I print it when I am in a cynical mood. It goes like this. I am reading the newspapers while drinking my hot coffee. I see a shocking story that is impossible to believe.

So speechless and paralysed, the coffee spills on my leg, burns me badly and I have to be rushed to the hospital. This happened to me last week when I read what the government said about the hassles the commercial banks put people through. I could not believe in 2023, government leaders would say these things when more than ten years ago, my crusade on this page began against the banks’ mistreatment of small depositors.

Where were the top leaders in the PPP government before 2015 and where were the big wigs from the PNC and AFC administration after 2015 when they took the reins of power? Normally, when I write on a subject that I have touched on before, I would cite the previous columns.

I have so many pieces condemnatory of the banks’ attitude that I do not know where to start in citing the previous articles. So I just decided, I would not. There are just too many of them. I touched on every aspect of this mistreatment, from proof of address demand, requirements for renewal of lapsed accounts, the banks’ misinterpretation of the anti-money laundering legislation, complaints on the criteria for opening an account to the asinine attitude when compared to foreign banks.

After my daughter came back from studies abroad in 2019, I remember twice relating on this page what she told me about the ease of opening an account in Europe. I have published in these columns the countless conversations I have had with Dr. Gobind Ganga, central bank governor, on the mistreatment.

Dr. Ganga will readily admit to these never-ending dialogues and constant implorations for central bank intervention over the years.  So, the coffee burnt my leg when I read the annoyance that government leaders showed and the changes they have proposed.

But the question will remain with me forever – where were they, both from the PPP and APNU+AFC governments – before 2023 when the letter sections of the newspapers carried the tears of small depositors and I was crusading against the banks on this page?

What the government’s acknowledgement showed is that there is the paralysis of spirit in this country? The central bank’s proposed directives to the commercial banks came ten years late. With the plethora of evidence before both the PPP and APNU+AFC governments, where was the thought to act?

I am going to reveal a wrong thing by the Bank of Nova Scotia implemented about five years ago that has remained a secret. Well, actually, it could no longer have remained a secret after I exposed it. But no one talked about it and the government did absolutely nothing about it.

Do not take my word for it. Research it the way I did. Nova Scotiabank has a policy where if a depositor has one million or under one million in an account, they have to pay a yearly surcharge of $5000.

Think of how sinister and downright sadistic is this policy. So, if you are a pensioner and you have your one million account for hard times in the future, after 10 years, you would have paid Nova Scotia $50, 000 just for keeping your one million. This is illegal and it must come to an immediate end.

But wait! What makes you think the banks will adhere to the edicts, which the central bank is about to send off? I told Dr. Ganga about some of the unnecessary burdens and I remember on two occasions he used these exact words: “I will call them right now.”

Whether he called them or not, the impositions I spoke to him continued. I know Dr. Ganga very well. We have enjoyed a long familiarity and he is a pleasant personality. But the central bank has failed small depositors. The tragic, painful tragic nature of this country is that it is the embodiment of the French saying: “The more things change, the more they remain the same.” The banks and other financial houses will continue to harass small depositors because small depositors have no one to protect them.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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