.. says previous beneficiaries should pay back
Farmers and other stakeholders in the agricultural sector are expressing concern over the suspension of agricultural loans accessed through the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending by the Central Bank of Nigeria recently.
NIRSAL, a US$500 million non-bank financial institution wholly owned by the Central Bank of Nigeria, was established in 2013 to catalyse the flow of finance and investments into fixed agricultural value chains and de-risk agric lending across the country to achieve food self-sufficiency and economic diversification.
It handles most of the agric loans to farmers by the CBN, especially its popular Anchor Borrower Programme.
Now, the apex bank has said it suspects fraudulent activities in NIRSAL loans under the ABP and ordered for the suspension of such loans until all previously beneficiaries have paid back.
It is not yet clear if the suspension is on the CBN Anchor Borrowers Programme alone or also includes those of Micro finance banks through NIRSAL.
The suspension has grounded loan activities in NIRSAL and farmers are worried that, among others, the timing was wrong, as many of them have already gone far with plans to expand their agricultural production.
Many farmers waiting for NIRSAL disbursement through their social media handle expressed sadness over the suspension of the loan facility as it threatened to ground their dreams for expansion.
Reacting to the development, the leadership of the All Farmer Association of Nigeria, headed by Architect Kabiru Ibrahim, who spoke with newsmen, said though the CBN blames NIRSAL in the non-performance of the ABP, it should do the needful in fishing out those responsible. It should continue to provide qualified farmers the much-needed support.
“We urge the CBN to do due diligence in prequalifying farmers who participate in the programme because several cases of briefcase farmers who pose as real farmers abound. These collude with some NIRSAL officials to defraud the programme.
“Timely repayment which is not forthcoming in the ABP is largely due to this fraud. Anyone who gives bribe to take a loan with an interest component has no desire to repay it.
“Our initial understanding of the role of NIRSAL was to primarily incentivize commercial banks to embrace lending for agricultural production but certainly not to prequalify prospective loan seeking companies. This is how corruption took over and the farmers are now the worse for it.
“We call on the CBN to reverse its decision on the disbursement of the ABP support to farmers,” he said.