2 million Nigerians to benefit from from FG’s TraderMoni loans: BOI

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The Executive Director on Financial inclusion, Bank of Industry, Toyin Adeniji, said yesterday that they will not relent until every Nigerian who is willing, have access to loan irrespective of the status or level of education.

Speaking at the unveiling of ‘Trader Moni’ initiative at Ojuwoye market in Lagos, Adeniji said that the programme which is activated nationwide will support 2 million Nigerians to grow their business.

She disclosed that the goal of the scheme was to take financial inclusion down to the grass root whereby pure water seller, bread seller, food seller, okada rider among others can access loan to expand their business without any collateral.

She stated: “This ‘Trader Moni’ initiative is a mobile phone driven, after your details have been captured by agent and send to BoI system for validation, within 48 hours you will get cash notification in your mobile wallet account. You can either transfer the cash to your bank account or cash it out in any mobile money agent around.

“At the beginning you can access N10,000 and pay back N10,250 to qualify for N15,000. Once you payback N15,375 you will qualify for N20,000 loan, when you pay back N21,000 you will get N50,000. All these stages have duration of six months interval to pay back.”

Chief Operating Officer of MarketMoni, Uzoma Nwagba, said the objective is empowerment. “For people at this level, nobody really watches out for them. A lot of them cannot walk into any bank and get the manager’s audience. This government recognizes the economic contribution at this level and reason we are focusing on empowering the masses.”

The Iyaloja of Ojuwoye market, Alhaja Mufuliyat Abimbola Adebunmi, who likened it to a sustainable stomach infrastructure, said they are happy government has decided to make provisions for them.

“My advice is for traders to take advantage of this assistance from government to support their business and not divert it to personal stuffs or use it to buy Ankara. It is to grow their business and pay back so that they can get more.”