Unique Insurance Company, one of the pioneer insurance companies in the country, has met the regulator’s new minimum capital requirement which has its deadline set at the end of 2021.
The company’s ability to raise the money came from a smart move from its major shareholder, the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), through the Teachers Fund which has acquired the Ghana Mineworkers Union’s shares and injected over GH¢38million into their operations, bringing its total shares to 88 percent from 7 percent.
Commenting on this development in an interview with the B&FT, Managing Director of Unique Insurance Company, Victor Obeng-Adiyiah, said meeting the new capital requirement is a big relief for the company – as this now allows it to focus its attention on various expansionary strategies which have been tabled for the next few years.
One key strategy of the company is to open up its branches and contact office network to make services easily accessible to the insuring public. To achieve this, the company has started talks with its majority shareholder, GNAT, to use its regional and district offices to serve the wider teacher market.
Another strategy for the company is to leverage the financial capacity of its parent company to venture into other risk areas within the insurance industry. This, Mr. Adiyiah said, would be done professionally while adhering strictly to corporate governance systems.
Unique Insurance is now one of the subsidiaries of The Teachers Fund (TF), which is the investment company of GNAT that has Aviance, TF Hostels, TF Financial Services, Credit Mall, TF Properties and Sweden Ghana Medical Centre under it. The Teachers Fund had funds under management in excess of GH¢2billion at the end of 2nd quarter 2021.
It will be recalled that Unique Insurance from its initial years was set up to provide tailor-made products in insurance for the labour force in this country, with Labour Enterprises Trust (LET) as the initial shareholder.
