Mechanical Lloyd Company Limited, one of the leading automobile companies in the country has held its 14th Annual General Meeting (AGM) for the year 2005 and has declared a dividend of ¢40.00 per share amounting to ¢2,003,837,000, representing 33.33% increase over last year's.

The Chairman of Board of Directors Mr. Yaw Manu Sarpong noted that the Ghanaian economy in 2005 continued on its path of steady and stable improvement, describing "the performance of the cedi against major international currencies as even more impressive." He however was not very happy with Ghana Commercial Bank (GCB) for not adhering to the gesture of Bank of Ghana to make more funds available for lending to the private sector at reasonable cost, aimed at growing the economy to a middle income status within 10 years.

Mr. Sarpong asked GCB to narrow its spread between the lending rates and borrowing rates to be more in line with what obtains in other developing economies so that it would reflect the economic realities in the country.

"Until this is done, long-term investment which is crucial for Ghana's economic growth and development will not materialize, and the government's efforts will not achieve the desired results", he said.

He said the bureaucratic nature of the Procurement Law enacted last year for ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), which accounts for 60% of all pick up sales in the country slowed down sales tremendously.

"For 2005 we achieved a turnover of ¢111.76 billion which was 7.18% below that of 2004" he observed.

With the above not withstanding, the company's sales to the private sector was very remarkable. He declared: "We have adopted a strategy of concentrating on sales to the private sector and improving our service delivery."

Mr. Sarpong announced to shareholders that the residential property development for the company has been completed, which income added ¢1.46 billion to its profit.

For the company's outlook for 2006 and beyond, he assured that having investment in infrastructure, human and IT resources, the company is poised and well focused to achieve appreciable growth.