President of woman empowerment group, Certificate in Entrepreneur Management, CEM, Felicia Chika Okafor has accused President Muhammadu Buhari of frustrating efforts to access loans from the N220bn Central Bank of Nigeria Micro Small and Medium Enterprises Development Fund, MSMEDF.
The N220bn CBN, MSMEDF, was flagged off by former President, Goodluck Jonathan in August 2014, in order to have aspiring young entrepreneurs trained, mentored and provided with required tool kits to start and grow their businesses.
Jonathan during the lunch disbursed N869.9m to four beneficiaries, Akwa-Ibom State, N260m, Delta State N500m; Labo Microfinance Limited N100m and Grassroots Microfinance Limited N9.9m.
Following the outcome of the 2015 generation election which saw the emergence of Buhari, Okafor lamented that since then all effort made to access funds from the scheme have prove abortive.
“We started with 15 memberships as students of Enterprise Development Center, EDC, and we have been growing since then.
“But the trouble of election stopped us and we have been at a standstill since then because there was change of government and waiting for the minister appointment.
“Now it has come we don’t know if that will continue.
“There is no agric friendly facility in the country; the closest is that of BOA which is 9%per annum but the moratorium is not friendly.”
Buhari on November 14, in collaboration with the CBN diverted money meant to be disbursed to a backlog of applicants to fund Anchor Borrowers’ Programme, ABP, initiative flagged off in Kebbi State recently.
Under the ABP, the CBN in a statement said it had set aside the sum of N40bn from the N220bn MSMEDF for farmers at a single-digit interest rate of 9.0% to address the challenges of poor funding.
Okafor while highlighting these bottlenecks said “The main challenge in growing businesses is lack of facilities and funding.
“There are lots of businesses that if you just Google you get support but what about status?
“A lot of the facilities are not available for starters, if you do not have family and friends that will build you up to a certain level then you cannot access it.
“I was the secretary to the Lagos State Fish Farmers Association for two years and then you see lots of Microfinance Banks coming to us and some agric friendly banks come and access their funds but the interest rate is not agric friendly because by the time you are through you are paying interest rate of between 25 to 30%.
“And then, agric fund that Nigeria is bringing out, they did not sit with the farmers to determine them.
“If they do they will realize that the terms and conditions are not good,” Okafor said.
According to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, “The shambolic state of the nation’s economy within the period, which represents the worst in the nation’s contemporary history, is direct fallout of uncertainty created by the inability of the Buhari-led government to chart a clear-cut economic policy, worsened by abuse of regulations, and flagrant violation of constitutional provisions.”
Post Nigeria
The N220bn CBN, MSMEDF, was flagged off by former President, Goodluck Jonathan in August 2014, in order to have aspiring young entrepreneurs trained, mentored and provided with required tool kits to start and grow their businesses.
Jonathan during the lunch disbursed N869.9m to four beneficiaries, Akwa-Ibom State, N260m, Delta State N500m; Labo Microfinance Limited N100m and Grassroots Microfinance Limited N9.9m.
Following the outcome of the 2015 generation election which saw the emergence of Buhari, Okafor lamented that since then all effort made to access funds from the scheme have prove abortive.
“We started with 15 memberships as students of Enterprise Development Center, EDC, and we have been growing since then.
“But the trouble of election stopped us and we have been at a standstill since then because there was change of government and waiting for the minister appointment.
“Now it has come we don’t know if that will continue.
“There is no agric friendly facility in the country; the closest is that of BOA which is 9%per annum but the moratorium is not friendly.”
Buhari on November 14, in collaboration with the CBN diverted money meant to be disbursed to a backlog of applicants to fund Anchor Borrowers’ Programme, ABP, initiative flagged off in Kebbi State recently.
Under the ABP, the CBN in a statement said it had set aside the sum of N40bn from the N220bn MSMEDF for farmers at a single-digit interest rate of 9.0% to address the challenges of poor funding.
Okafor while highlighting these bottlenecks said “The main challenge in growing businesses is lack of facilities and funding.
“There are lots of businesses that if you just Google you get support but what about status?
“A lot of the facilities are not available for starters, if you do not have family and friends that will build you up to a certain level then you cannot access it.
“I was the secretary to the Lagos State Fish Farmers Association for two years and then you see lots of Microfinance Banks coming to us and some agric friendly banks come and access their funds but the interest rate is not agric friendly because by the time you are through you are paying interest rate of between 25 to 30%.
“And then, agric fund that Nigeria is bringing out, they did not sit with the farmers to determine them.
“If they do they will realize that the terms and conditions are not good,” Okafor said.
According to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, “The shambolic state of the nation’s economy within the period, which represents the worst in the nation’s contemporary history, is direct fallout of uncertainty created by the inability of the Buhari-led government to chart a clear-cut economic policy, worsened by abuse of regulations, and flagrant violation of constitutional provisions.”
Post Nigeria
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