The Governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), Dr Johnson Asiama, has defended the central bank’s decision to cancel the Gold-for-Oil programme in March 2025, while emphasising ongoing efforts to improve the efficiency of the Gold-for-Reserves initiative.

Appearing before Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in Accra, Dr Asiama noted that one of the key objectives of the Gold-for-Oil policy, to reduce fuel shortages and long queues at pumps, has been met following its cancellation.

“The first reference is to observe that since we cancelled the Gold-for-Oil in March 2025, we have not seen a build-up of queues at the pumps. One of the objectives of the policy was for that. So, we believe that the cancellation was worth it,” he said on Monday, January 12.

The Governor acknowledged that the Gold-for-Oil programme had encountered several operational challenges, prompting the Bank of Ghana to commission a thorough review.

He revealed that the Board had authorised an external audit of the policy, with approval from the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) obtained two months ago, and that the audit is currently underway.

"There were too many issues under the Gold-for-Oil that we needed to unearth. Therefore, the board authorised an external audit into the policy. We got a PPA approval for the audit two months ago. That exercise is underway"

Turning to the Gold-for-Reserves initiative, Dr Asiama clarified that the policy’s principal aim is to bolster Ghana’s foreign exchange reserves.

He stressed that, based on available data, the programme remains viable, but requires targeted reforms to eliminate inefficiencies and enhance its effectiveness.

“The objective of Gold-for-Reserves, as the name suggests, is for us to increase reserves,” he explained.

“Based on the data available, so far, the evidence is clear that it is not a case of shutting it down, but a question of enhancing its efficiency, looking at inefficiencies that we have to take out. That is why we went after GoldBod.”