The Management of International Commercial Bank (ICB) has sought to dispel the erroneous impression that it is under some form of pressure and its clients dissatisfied with their operations following media reports of its alleged refusal to pay the remittances of some of its customers.
Some sections of the media had reported that ICB was illegally holding on to funds belonging to its clients; a remittance of � 15,000 and that the bank has rebuffed all pressure mounted on it to effect payment.
But speaking at a press briefing at its Headquarters, Managing Director of ICB, Sanjeev Anand, denied the publication as factually inaccurate. According to him, ICB is simply adhering to the country�s anti-money laundering regulations.
Mr Sanjeev Anand pointed out that ICB since its launch in 1996 has contributed significantly to the various segments of the Ghanaian economy especially individual and small-medium businesses over the years.
�ICB met the new regulatory stated capital in time and has the necessary strength to deliver financial services on its own�universally; it has become important that anti-money laundering guidelines are adhered to�so at any given point in time when there are certain funds which are suspicious�, the regulatory authorities pick it up and they do the investigations and after they do the investigations, once they give clearance the funds are paid to the customer. So it�s very important for us to adhere to these strict guidelines. We are trying our best to assist the regulatory authorities in this endeavor of theirs�.So in this particular case, when we found that this particular remittance was of a suspicious nature, the regulatory authorities took upon themselves to investigate and once they give us the clearance, then the bank will pay. So we are not holding back the funds because we want to hold back the funds, it is because this particular remittance is been investigated by the authorities and we are just waiting for the clearance�so that�s where we are�,� the ICB MD said.
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