Bankers urged to seek further studies
Mrs Betty Mould Iddrisu, Minister of Education, has called on Bankers to scale up their capacity and study further to broaden their know-how in serving the growing demands of their customers in the Banking industry.
She asked the Bankers to keep their focus and seize the opportunity available to address the challenges pertaining to good customer delivery.
Mrs Mould Iddrisu said this in a speech read for her by Dr Dominick Pealore, Director of Statistics, Research, Information Management and Public Relations at the Ministry of Education, at the second congregation and graduation ceremony of the Chartered Institute of Bankers (CIB) Ghana in Accra on Saturday.
In all 50 students graduated in the intermediate and 100 students in final categories.
She commended the institute for being the only professional body that offered education in Banking and Finance in the country.
She said the overall goal of the Ministry was to provide relevant and quality education for all Ghanaians to enable them acquire skills.
The Minister said this would make them functionally literate and productive to facilitate poverty alleviation and promote the rapid socio-economic growth the country needed.
She congratulated the graduates for the successful completion of their academic excellence training and expressed the hope they would apply their skills to benefit the whole society.
Mr Anthony Oppong, Chief Executive Officer of CIB, said plans were advanced to introduce other certificate courses next year in line with the dynamics of the industry.
He said such programs would include: Professionalism and Ethics in Banking, Investment Planning, Risk Management, Good Corporate Governance, Customer Relationship Management, Product Development and Management and Operational Management among others.
He said the institute within the year introduced a three-month Basic certificate course in Banking Operations meant for staff that did possess the requisite banking background but were working in the banking and finance industry.
Mr Oppong said the course content and structure of the institute was streamlined along the requirements of the Alliance of African Institute of Bankers to gain global recognition and that the CIB Ghana was also a member of the World Conference of Banking Institute.
He urged the graduates to use the opportunity to establish their own businesses in other areas not necessarily in the financial sector.
Various categories of awards were presented to students who performed creditably in different subjects with Ms Yvonne Mills-Robertson, a staff of Barclays Bank of Ghana Limited, being adjudged as the overall best student and was presented with the Bank of Ghana Prize.
The CIB was registered in 1978 under the Professional Bodies Decree of 1973 (NRCD 143) to serve as a professional body for banks and other financial institutions with the aim to provide stimulus for the development of competent and more qualified human resources that would enable banks offer efficient and competitive services.
Source: GNA