‘We have data of all TraderMoni beneficiaries’ — BOI refutes NSIP’s ‘poor record’ claim in Kwara

September 12, 2020 9:49 am

The Bank of Industry (BOI) has refuted the claim that poor record of TraderMoni beneficiaries is a cause of non-repayment of loans.

The TraderMoni programme, which was launched in 2018, is designed to provide soft loans of N10,000 to boost small scale businesses.

The programme was formerly managed by the office of Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo.

On Wednesday, Bashirah Abdulrazaq-Sanusi, Kwara state focal person for the National Social Investment Programme (NSIP), said some beneficiaries of TraderMoni are reluctant to repay loans.

She added that “those that disbursed the money do not have records of beneficiaries like phone numbers and addresses, thus, making it difficult to track them for repayment.”

But in a statement, BOI refuted the claim, saying records of all TraderMoni beneficiaries are available in its database.

It said all NSIP focal persons have been provided with information on Government Enterprise and Empowerment Program (GEEP) beneficiaries, under which the TraderMoni scheme is established.

“This includes beneficiary names, phone numbers, and business location,” the statement read.

“We would like to state that the fully digitized loan records and biodata of all 2,418,936 GEEP beneficiaries are electronically stored in a central database. The data can be viewed at the GEEP Command Center of the Bank of Industry which is open to the public.

“The programme relies heavily on technology to deliver its three loan products; namely, TraderMoni, MarketMoni and FarmerMoni. The loan cycle for every GEEP applicant involves the following processes: Extensive KYC and data validation via mobile forms.”

BOI explained that GEEP agents nationwide are equipped with a proprietary mobile application that enables the full registration and capture of up to 43 unique data points of every single applicant.

It said such information include beneficiary’s biodata, contact information, nature of trade, GPS coordinates of the trade point, picture of the beneficiary and beneficiary’s trade, and all other data on identification and credit assessment.

The bank said all submitted beneficiary data go through several points of verification to ensure validity of the registration process, adding that it is after verification that applicants are able to receive loans.

“Consequently, every loan given out on the programme can be traced to a beneficiary involved in a known trade, at a known location, within a known market association, cooperative or farming cluster. Due to data privacy restrictions, we are unable to publish personally identifiable customer information of the Bank of Industry,” it read.

“GEEP makes it easy for beneficiaries to repay the loans. The loan repayments are broken down into small manageable amounts payable weekly. In addition, GEEP beneficiaries are able to repay their loans through multiple channels.

“Since the inception of the programme, several beneficiaries have successfully repaid their loans and gone on to access higher TraderMoni and MarketMoni loans.

“It is imperative we set the record straight concerning the operations of GEEP, so as to guard against misleading the general public.”