Nigerian
banks may have agreed to halt the retrenchment of their workforce following
threats by the Federal Government top sanction them. It was learnt yesterday
that they agreed to minimise the planned sack.
The
Managing Director of Standard Chartered Bank, Mrs. Bola Adesola made the
disclosure at the end of the Bankers Committee Meeting in Abuja yesterday.
“Banks
in the country are looking at ways to ensure that we minimise exits from our
institutions. There will always be exits if there is fraud and so forth, people
will exit institutions”, Mrs. Adesola told reporters after the meeting.
She
said banks pulling back on retrenching workers is not new stressing that “it is
something we have discussed in the past where the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)
governor prevailed on the banks to minimise any exits from the institutions.”
Her
words: “Banks understand the implication of people not being in employment. So,
we noted the market sentiments and going forward it will be difficult but there
will be reasons why people will exit not just in the banking industry but in
telecoms and other industries. It is something that we will manage.”
Mrs.
Adesola also disclosed the development of a National Collateral Registry by the
apex bank as part of efforts to deepen financial inclusion in the system,
adding that the CBN has put the framework and technology in place.
“The
CBN”, she said, “has begun to engage stakeholders so we should expect the
rollout of the collateral registry to be made available to banks to register
moveable assets that they lend against.”
She
said that a policy statement that will make the banks’ credit process more
robust in lending to customers against moveable assets would soon be out.
According
to her, the collateral registry will enable customers have access to credit
facility with their phone sets and any other assets and still retain the
services of those assets once they are properly registered.
She
said the introduction of the registry will eliminate the barriers for those
hitherto constrained by lack of collateral from taking loans.
“Once
your car is registered, you can take a loan and then be using it to pay back
your loan. But if you default in paying back, that car may be recovered at the
appropriate time”, she said.
In
his remarks, the outgoing Managing Director of United Bank for Africa (UBA)
Plc., Mr Philip Oduoza, warned currency speculators that they would be
deceived when the much awaited flexible exchange rate is rolled out.
He
said: “The CBN has received a lot of input from various stakeholders and these
inputs are being distilled with a view to get a robust flexible exchange rate
model.
“In
a very short while, the framework is going to be ready and once this happens,
it is going to be made public and we will start running with it immediately.
“The
Bankers’ Committee believes that it is important that we get it right right so
we don’t have to go back to the drawing board.
“We
need to exercise a little bit of patience but we tell you that we are coming up
with a framework that will be able to address a lot of the issues that surround
foreign exchange in Nigeria.
“Anybody
engaging in currency speculation would be deceived at the end of the day
because once these frameworks are released you will find out that a lot of the
issues that have been affecting foreign exchange in Nigeria would be dealt
with, people need to be very careful and we should exercise a bit of patience
so that once we roll it out it is going to be one that will suite our
environment and peculiarities.”
In
her opening remarks, CBN’s Banking Supervision Director, Mrs. Tokunbo
Martins said: “Commercial and micro finance banks have been given targets for
savings and credits and in order to meet that target there have been agreements
to move away from traditional access points to more electronic points.”
The
CBN official said an agreement has been reached with the Money Deposit Banks
(MDBs) and the Micro Finance Banks (MDBs) on a linkage model.
Mrs.
Martins said the agreement would enable the MDBs to lend to the MFBs, who would
in turn, grant facilities to customers at the grassroots.
“That
should, to a very large extent, improve financial inclusion in the country.”
she said
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