A French Exit: Ghana Clears a Moroccan Bank to Take Société Générale

A French bank is leaving Ghana. A Moroccan one is lined up to take the keys.

Société Générale agreed on 1 October to sell its entire 60.22 per cent of Société Générale Ghana. Attijariwafa Bank takes 55.22 per cent. Ghana's Social Security and National Insurance Trust takes the other 5 per cent. SSNIT said that lifts its holding from 19.36 per cent to 24.36 per cent, and that the new majority owner takes the clients, the staff and the books.

Joy Business reported on 5 October that the Bank of Ghana has issued a no-objection. The Bank has not put that letter on its own site. The securities regulator still has to clear the transfer of the shares. Until that paper lands, the name on the door does not change.

Whose pension sits in the deal

SSNIT is the buyer that matters to a Ghanaian worker. The trust said the extra 5 per cent is meant to protect contributors' retirement money and keep a local hand on a big bank. It thanked the finance minister for help in securing the stake.

For a Kenyan reader this is a foreign owner cashing out, not a change to a Nairobi account. The closest local picture is the phone-loan book at KSh 165.1 billion: different product, same question of who holds the licence. Staff in Accra stay. The owner does not. The French group denied an exit story in 2024. The 1 October agreement is the exit.