The New Patriotic Party (NPP) Minority in Parliament has challenged the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) to account for the losses associated with its gold trading operations, which have resulted in significant financial losses to the state.
The Minority’s demand followed a recent report by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that the Domestic Gold Purchase Programme by the Bank of Ghana (BoG), implemented through GoldBod, recorded losses of more than $1.7 billion (approximately GH¢22 billion) in 2025, equivalent to 1.5% of Ghana’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Addressing a news conference at Parliament House in Accra on August 18, 2026, the Minority Leader and Member of Parliament (MP) for Effutu, Osahen Alexander Afenyo-Markin argued that the GoldBod cannot take credit for foreign exchange gains in the country through their activities while distancing itself from the costs and losses arising from the same transactions.
GoldBod, he reiterated, must account for the full cost of the operations from which it derives revenue, including the fees it collects and the losses arising from its purchasing, pricing and sales decisions.
“So here is a question GoldBod must answer. If every one of those services, service fees and asset fees were collected and kept, why should the losses that came bundled with earning them belong to someone else?” he asked.
“You do not get to keep the fees and disown the cost. This is not accounting; that is convenience,” he added.
‘Alter ego’ accounting and audit gaps
The Minority accused GoldBod of using BoG as its “alter ego”, carrying losses on BoG’s books while retaining fees and credit for revenue.
“GoldBod took Bank of Ghana’s money to assay gold and collect its fees. It cannot claim the credit that comes with revenue while pushing every loss into Bank of Ghana’s balance sheets,” Osahen Afenyo-Markin reiterated.
According to him, the Auditor-General, which claimed GoldBod made a profit, was not given the full picture.
“If the Auditor-General knew that the costs of GoldBod transactions were borne by Bank of Ghana, he would not have declared a surplus in its report,” he said.
The Minority Leader said this arrangement amounted to “causing financial loss to the state” and that those responsible “must account.”
BoG stops funding, fees cut after pressure
The Minority caucus further noted that actions taken by authorities in recent months confirm the seriousness of the problem.
The Bank of Ghana, as disclosed by Osahen Afenyo-Markin, has resolved to stop financing GoldBod’s gold purchasing operations.
He said GoldBod itself consequently announced on August 11, 2026, that it had ended its role as buying agent for BoG.
Since March 2026, he said, GoldBod has ceased receiving BoG funds for gold purchases and is now seeking financing from commercial banks and off-takers.
“When fees were 15%, and we raised the first red flag, there was an emergency joint board meeting, and they cut it to 9%. When we escalated it with a motion on the floor, they cut it further to 5%. If 15% was legitimate, why didn’t it remain?” the Minority Leader quizzed rhetorically.
‘Off-takers must be known’
Osahen Afenyo-Markin also questioned the identity of the off-takers who benefited from discounted gold sales, demanding greater transparency over the transactions.
He maintained that GoldBod could not claim the benefits of the gold trade while shifting the associated losses onto the BoG.
The Minority therefore demanded answers from GoldBod on the identities of its off-takers, the rationale for discounted gold sales and why the country’s gold trading mandate was generating losses that were not transparently disclosed.
“GoldBod is happy to take credit for the foreign exchange he claims to have generated. But it goes quiet the moment we ask about the very trade that discounted sales, the fee arrangement that produced that forex in the first place,” he said.
“You cannot claim the upside of a trade and disown a downside,” Osahen Afenyo-Markin added.
The Minority Leader said the concerns were not about denying GoldBod the credit for its reported profits but about examining the underlying transactions and costs that generated those returns.
“We, the Minority, are not here to relegate the profit of GoldBod. The profit GoldBod has published in its own accounts. We are here because of what happened off the books, the operations, the fee structures, the discounted sales that made that profit possible in the first place,” he said.
Osahen Afenyo-Markin also questioned the arrangement under which the BoG provided funds for gold purchases while allegedly carrying the resulting losses.
“GoldBod took Bank of Ghana’s money to assay gold and collect its fees. It cannot claim the credit that comes with the revenue while pushing every loss into Bank of Ghana’s balance sheets,” he argued.
He averred that the arrangement had effectively separated the benefits of the transactions from the risks, leaving the central bank and ultimately the taxpayer to bear the losses.
‘Post-regime accountability awaits you’
Osahen Afenyo-Markin has warned that officials of the GoldBod will face accountability over the reported losses under the Bank of Ghana’s Domestic Gold Purchase Programme.
The Minority, he emphasised, will continue to demand answers over what it describes as significant financial losses to the state.
“The Minority will say this firmly and boldly. It doesn’t matter the adjectives you will use to attack our personality. We know that a day of reckoning will come. They should remember that post-regime accountability awaits them,” he said.
Osahen Afenyo-Markin maintained that the Minority would not be deterred by criticism and would continue to demand explanations from GoldBod and the government.
He warned that those currently responsible for managing the programme should not assume they would escape scrutiny in the future.
By Kyei Boateng
