Marine & General Insurance Brokers at 50 rebrands to OLEA/M&G

As Marine and General Insurance Company chalks 50 this year and rebrands to OLEA/M&G Insurance Brokers to become a member of the OLEA Group - a Pan African insurance broking outfit that cuts across Africa - B&FT x-rays its beginnings from where it started to where it has now reached. Today, the new brand operates from a new location along Examination Drive near the West African Examination Council (WAEC).

OLEA/M&G Insurance Brokers has opened up their strategy to forge forward in the brokerage sector, where the company is currently in a competitive environment with over 80 insurance broking companies. Its new Managing Director, Stephen Kwarteng Yeboah, briefs Ghana on the struggles from 1969 to date.

The briefing ceremony was witnessed by a lot of dignitaries which included Mr. Justice Ofori, National Insurance Commissioner; Olivier Dubois, Executive Chairman of OLEA Group; Ms. Aretha Duku, President-Ghana Insurance Association; Lena Adu-Kofi, President, Insurance Brokers Association of Ghana (IBAG); and Daniel Awuah Darko, Group Chairman-Vanguard Assurance; and various chief executive officers from the insurance industry.

Stephen Kwarteng Yeboah, in his welcome address, gave a brief history on Marine and General Brokers - the first indigenous broking outfit that started operations in Ghana during 1969.

According to him, the company was founded by Late Nana Awuah-Darko Ampem 1 (known in private life as Daniel Quarshie Awuah-Darko), who went to the United Kingdom on a Ghana government scholarship to study Insurance in Banking in 1956 at the City of London College, London.

He graduated in 1960 and worked with institutions in London like Pearl Assurance Company Limited in 1958, and Messrs. Cuthbert Health and Company Limited Insurance Brokers at Lloyds of London in 1960.

His experience at Lloyds, where he made history as the first Ghanaian Lloyds Broker, gave birth to the vision of establishing Marine & General Brokers Company Limited later in Ghana.

Nana returned to Ghana in 1963, and turning down an appointment with Royal Exchange Assurance he joined the State Shipping Corporation (Black Star Line) as Insurance and Claims Manager.

In 1969, he resigned from Black Star Line and formed Marine & General Brokers Co. Ltd. as the first insurance broking company in Ghana. He received support from some of his friends - notably Chief Akin-George, a Nigerian; and Mr. Roland Kenneth Brown, a Briton, both of whom he enjoyed a lifelong friendship and partnership with while in London.

Marine & General Brokers handled the businesses of key institutions including the Bank of Ghana, National Savings and Credit Bank, and Black Star Line being the only insurance broking house in the country, Marine & General Brokers grew in leaps and bounds - much to the chagrin of the establishment.

Unfortunately, in 1972 an NLC decree was passed at the instigation of some top management at State Insurance Corporation that made it obligatory for all government institutions to deal directly with the State Insurance Corporation without recourse to the only broker. Even if a broker was involved, commission was not to be paid to the broker.

To make matters worse, SIC’s management decided to protect its agency force through a policy that abolished payment of commission by SIC to brokers - even on non-government businesses that the broker placed. This anti-broker environment dealt a crippling blow to the only broker in existence, and the company faced imminent financial crisis.

Frustrating as it was, it provoked the founder to establish his own Insurance Company as a way out of the predicament and to provide the few private enterprises an alternative. With the assistance of friends like R.K. Brown, J.E.K Ansah, Hamilton K. Biney, Mr. J. Akin-George and J. Asamani, Vanguard Assurance Company Limited was established in 1974.

However, in 2003, the Directors engaged the services of Mr. Samuel Asante Appiagyei (Now Nana Appiagyei Dankawoso 1) who was an Assistant Manager at Vanguard Assurance, as Managing Director. Mr. Edward Akumfi-Agyemang, who was the secretary to the board, was also appointed as board chairman in 2005.

Nana Appiagyei Dankawoso brought in a new breed of professionals into the company. He embarked on vigorous re-engineering of the company and diversified the company portfolio with support from the board. He managed the company for 15 years and retired in September 2018, handing over to the current Managing Director.