Chartered Institute of Bankers (CIB), Ghana has crowned the University of Ghana, Legon as champion of the second National Banking and Ethics Challenge (NBEC 2.0), held at the CIB Ghana Auditorium in Accra. The University of Ghana Business School finished first with 35 points, ahead of the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA) on 29.5 points and the University for Development Studies (UDS) on 26.5 points, in a keenly contested Grand Finale that drew faculty, students, and banking industry leaders from across the country.
Competition growing in scale and ambition
NBEC 2.0 marked a significant expansion of the competition, with twelve universities participating; more than double the five institutions that took part in the inaugural edition in May 2025. The competing institutions represented a broad cross-section of Ghana’s higher education sphere: KNUST, University of Ghana, University of Cape Coast (UCC), University of Education, Winneba (UEW), University for Development Studies (UDS), Central University, Academic City University College, Wisconsin International University College, All Nations University, Pentecost University College, and UPSA.
Together they spanned public research universities, private liberal arts colleges, and professionally oriented urban institutions, showing the national reach of the initiative.The competition unfolded across three progressive stages, preliminaries, semifinals, before culminating in the Grand Finale.
In his remarks, the Institute’s President, Benjamin Amenumey, described the initiative as both a training ground and a strategic intervention in the Banking sector’s future.
“The National Banking and Ethics Challenge was born of a simple conviction. The future of banking depends on professionals who are ethically grounded, intellectually sharp, and prepared for the global landscape that never stands still,” he said, adding that as innovation accelerates, sound judgment, accountability, and integrity become the sector’s true anchors.
This, he noted, contributed to the increased participation.
“The interest is so high we have twelve universities, and I am confident it can only get better. Every contestant who participated in the CIB Ghana 2026 National Banking and Ethics Challenge is a winner, in the knowledge they have acquired, the experiences, and the network,” Mr. Amenumey stated.
Tangible benefits for all participants
CIB Ghana announced a suite of concrete benefits for participants at this year’s event, reinforcing the Institute’s commitment to the professional development of the next generation of bankers.
GCB Bank will provide internship placements for all contestants who participated in NBEC 2.0, offering direct exposure to the banking industry. Contestants who choose to enroll as Chartered bankers with CIB Ghana will receive a 100 percent waiver on their registration fees, while non-contestant attendees who were present at the event are eligible for a 50 percent fee waiver on student registration. Furthermore, a dedicated mentorship corner provided career counselling and professional development guidance to students throughout the day, ensuring that every attendee left with more than a certificate.
Banking professionalism as the rationale
Mr. Robert Dzato , the CEO of CIB Ghana situated the NBEC within CIB Ghana’s core statutory mandate as enshrined in the Chartered Bankers Act 2019 (Act 911) — to promote the study of banking and regulate the practice of the banking profession. He articulated four overarching objectives driving the challenge, each operating at a distinct level of ambition.
The first and most fundamental is the development of trusted professionals. Mr. Dzato drew a striking analogy to convey the gravity of the banking profession: in the same way that errors in aviation can cost lives, failures in banking carry profound human consequences for savers, borrowers, businesses, and the wider economy. Behind every bad banking decision, he noted, there is a story of disrupted livelihoods, stalled education, and unmet health needs.
“Trust is the currency in banking. Cash is the raw material. The true currency is trust, and that trust comes from ethics, from character, from doing the right thing even when no one is watching,” he said.
The second objective aligns the NBEC with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals framework, specifically SDG 4 on quality education, which calls for expanded financial literacy programming at all levels. CIB Ghana’s decision to take the challenge to the university level reflects the Institute’s conviction that financial education must be embedded at every stage of a banking professional’s formation, not only at the point of industry entry.
The third objective is to broaden public financial education. Several questions in the competition were deliberately designed to equip students and by extension the wider public, with practical knowledge of banking products, processes for managing dormant accounts, procedures following the death of an account holder, and protection against the growing threat of cyber fraud and digital financial crime. The competition’s design principle, as Mr. Dzato noted, is that even non-contestants in the auditorium should leave better informed than when they arrived.
The fourth objective is sector-wide re-professionalization, Mr. Dzato was candid about the reputational context, particularly, headlines concerning banking misconduct, the 2017–2018 sector clean-up, and a documented rise in staff-related fraud have eroded public confidence in the industry.
The NBEC, he added, is a mechanism for building a cohort of bankers whose competence and ethics are credentialed, visible, and publicly accountable.
Mr Clifford Duke Mettle, a former President of the Chartered Institute of Bankers Ghana and a distinguished alumnus of the University of Ghana, challenged students and contestants to treat the challenge not as a passing exercise but as a formative professional experience.
Drawing on his own entry into the banking profession, he urged participants to internalise the knowledge encountered at the event and deploy it in their communities, as ambassadors of financial literacy and banking professionalism in conversations with family and friends long after the competition concluded. “Banking is a wonderful profession. It gives you status, but more than that, it gives you responsibility. The essence of what we are doing here is to show that once you work in a bank, people can trust you, people can believe in you,” Mr. Clifford Mettle said.
NBEC 2.0 scope
NBEC 2.0 tested contestants across a comprehensive range of contemporary banking and finance topics, reflecting the breadth of knowledge required of the modern chartered banker. The subject domains covered included everyday banking; products, services, dormant accounts, and estate banking procedures following the death of an account holder, and environmental, Sustainable Governance (ESG) principles.
Questions on fraud prevention and detection addressed cyber fraud, SIM swap fraud, and staff-related fraud, while the digital banking section examined the evolving digital currency landscape including cryptocurrency. Cybersecurity, consumer protection in digital financial environments, and financial literacy fundamentals, including the distinction between savings, current, and investment accounts, rounded out the curriculum.
The design of the question bank reflects NBEC’s dual mandate to develop technically capable professionals and to serve as a vehicle for public financial education. Questions were constructed so that even audience members with no prior banking training could benefit from the knowledge being exchanged on stage.
The Chartered Banker pathway
Mr. Dzato also outlined CIB Ghana’s four-level qualification structure for those seeking to become chartered bankers. The framework progresses from Fundamentals in Financial Services at Level 1, through Financial Services Practitioner at Level 2 and Expert Practitioner in Financial Services at Level 3, to Strategic Leader in Financial Services at Level 4.
The structure is designed around practitioner-responsive, modular learning, what Mr Dzato described as a shift from “just-in-case” to “just-in-time” education, allowing bankers to pursue depth in specific subject areas such as treasury management without completing the full qualification pathway.
The Institute also offers a suite of complementary programmes, including a digital learning academy, an ESG curriculum developed in partnership with the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA Ghana), and an ethics certification e-learning programme. The ethics programme, which is free to all member institutions including the Bank of Ghana, recorded approximately 10,000 completions under its first iteration; Ethics 2.0 was launched in early 2026. CIB Ghana also conducts biannual post-monetary policy seminars, bringing together the Ministry of Finance, the Bank of Ghana, the Association of Industries, and the banking community to discuss policy implications ahead of Monetary Policy Committee decisions.
NBEC 3.0 and beyond
Mr. Dzato confirmed that CIB Ghana intends to make the National Banking and Ethics Challenge an annual event, with plans for significant structural and thematic evolution in the next edition. On the institutional front, the Institute plans to introduce a regional zone format comprising a southern zone and a northern zone, broadening access for universities outside the Greater Accra catchment area and reducing logistical barriers for institutions in the north. This structural change, if implemented, would meaningfully increase the competition’s reach while maintaining the quality of the grand finale.
On content, NBEC 3.0 is expected to incorporate emerging regulatory areas, including developments around non-performing loans and digital assets and cryptocurrency, reflecting the rapidly evolving landscape that chartered bankers must navigate. Deeper institutional partnership with university banking and finance faculties is also a stated priority, including the sharing of CIB Ghana resources and the development of pathways for academic staff to themselves become chartered bankers.
“We are not limiting ourselves to Ghana. Our vision is to be the most relevant institute for professional banking education in Africa. We are developing trusted human capital for the continent,” Mr. Dzato said.
About CIB, Ghana
The Chartered Institute of Bankers (CIB) Ghana is the statutory professional body for banking and financial services professionals in Ghana, established under the Chartered Bankers Act 2019 (Act 911). The Institute’s mandate is to promote the study of banking and regulate the practice of the banking profession. CIB Ghana sits at the intersection of academia and industry, developing trusted, ethical, and competent professionals for the Ghanaian and African banking sectors. The Institute offers the Chartered Banker qualification across four levels, a digital learning academy, ethics certification, and ESG training programmes, and conducts regular policy dialogue with regulators and industry stakeholders.
