Next of kin, is simply a nominee designated by the account holder, serving as the main contact if the bank cannot reach the account holder according to Bank of Ghana (BoG).

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This implies that the next-of-kin designation in banking is meant for locating the account holder, not for determining who inherits the account.

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“This person should be close and know a lot about the account holder, and that is why in practice, many people would use some of their close relatives, Mr. Augustine Amoako Donkor, Assistant Director, Financial Stability Department of BoG, has said.

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He was speaking on the topic, “The Next-of-Kin Concept," as part of a two-day media capacity building workshop for selected journalists in the Ashanti Region.

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The workshop, which sought to deepen the understanding of participants in the operations of BoG and also build their capacity in financial reporting, was attended by 25 journalists.

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Resource persons from the Central Bank took them through microeconomic analysis and significance of microeconomic indicators, monetary policy practice in Ghana, inflation dynamics in Ghana, developments in foreign exchange market, as well as interpretation of the Monetary Policy Committee Pack.

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Mr. Donkor said a customer of a bank reserves the right to choose even a friend who knows much about him/her as the next of kin because the main purpose is to have someone who can provide information on why the account holder is not reachable.

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Processes to retrieve funds in the account of a deceased customer, according to him, is entirely a different issue when it is established that the owner of the account has indeed died.

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“To inherit or have access to the bank account of deceased person, one will have to be named in the deceased person’s will as a beneficiary of the account,” Mr. Donkor clarified.

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He explained that a named beneficiary would need to undergo a legal process in which a court of competent jurisdiction grants probate. This probate would give the beneficiary the legal authority to access the deceased person’s account.

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In cases where the account holder dies without a will, those with an interest in the estate must apply to be appointed as administrators. This requires the issuance of Letters of Administration by a court of competent jurisdiction, which would then allow them access to the deceased person's account, the BoG official added.

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“In Ghana, this concept of next-of-kin is not defined in our laws, so our discussion is based on what traditionally has been the practice, and that is what is likely to continue until such time that as a country we include this in a particular law,” he said.

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