ABUJA – The Bank of Industry (BoI) said it would appoint business development support plans for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to reduce cases of business failure leading to non-repayment of loans.
This is contained in a statement signed by the bank’s Head of Corporate Communication, Mrs Hadiza Olaosebikan, in Abuja on Sunday.
The statement stated that BoI Managing Director, Mr Rasheed Olaoluwa, made this known at the Senior Executive Course 36 of the Nigeria Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Jos.
It stated that Olaoluwa said the business development support programme would help to give necessary direction to any entrepreneur with viable business plans with a view to averting business failure.
“We are setting up a loan monitoring unit and that will address the issue of non-repayment of loans.
“In addition, we are in the process of appointing business development support plans that will hold the SMEs from the point of applying for loans through documentation, providing of securities, disbursement, and utilisation until full recovery is achieved. [eap_ad_1] “This business development support plans are at the point of being appointed and we believe that it will improve the performance of the SMEs,” it stated.
The statement stated that the loan conditions were not cumbersome, stressing that the loan would be given to any entrepreneur that answer the four basic questions.
The four questions it stated were what product are you offering, who are your target customers, what is your value proposition and how are you going to deliver that value proposition.
“Believe me, if you can answer those questions correctly, BIO will support you,” it stated.
The statement stated Olaoluwa advocated the establishment of Commercial Courts that would be able speedily deal with issue of loan defaulting and address the issue of low loans performance.
It stated that most banks in the country had gone down because of non-repayment of loans by the customers.
“We need access to funds to finance our businesses, but we also need to understand what the financial system is going through.
“When a bank collapses, nine out of 10 reasons why it collapsed, is because they have not been able to recover their loans.
“I know there are bank cases that have been in court for the last five to seven years with banks trying to recover loans that have proven very difficult because such cases are locked up in our normal courts.’’
It suggested that one way to address it was to have commercial courts that could fast track process for foreclosure of defaulting banks loans. (NAN)
[eap_ad_4]
