By Gbadamosi Oladimeji
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has disbursed N10.5bn out of the N100bn credit intervention for the healthcare industry, which is recently introduced as part of the measures to cushion the effect of the coronavirus pandemic on the economy.
The CBN Governor, Mr Godwin Emefiele, made this known in Abuja at the end of the MPC 273th meeting, held virtually.
According to him, “The committee recognised that under the N100bn healthcare sector intervention fund, the bank has approved and disbursed N10.15bn for some projects, for the establishment of advanced diagnostic and health centres and the expansion of some pharmaceutical plants for essential drugs and intravenous fluids.”
The apex bank however, stipulated the requirements to access the funds.
“In other to access the loans, a corporate entity must submit its application to a participating financial institution, which could be either be a Deposit Money Bank or a Development Finance Institution of its choice with a bankable business plan,” CBN stated in its guidelines.
Emefiele stated, in his latest guidelines, that the PFI must appraise and conduct due diligence on the application; and upon approval by the PFI’s credit committee, the application would be submitted to the apex bank with relevant documents attached.
“The CBN would process and disburse funds to the PFI for onward release to the project”, he said.
The CBN Governor noted that the PFI must receive and review applications submitted by its customers; undertake due diligence based on normal business considerations; and bear the credit risk.
“They must also issue offer letters and forward qualified applications to the CBN; disburse the released funds to successful applicants; monitor the project and recover the loans from the beneficiaries; and maintain adequate records of all beneficiaries and facilities”, he added.
However, it requires the PFIs to register all movable assets with the National Collateral Registry; forward periodic returns in the prescribed format on the scheme to the CBN; comply with the guidelines; and carry out any other duties as the CBN may prescribe from time to time.
