The suspension of the Anchor Borrowers Loans scheme by the Central Bank of Nigeria seems not to be going down well with a cross section of stakeholders.
The program was allegedly mismanaged by the Nigeria Incentive Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) leading to a suspension of all loans disbursed by NIRSAL, following widespread allegations of fraud and corruption by its officials.
The CBN’s suspension of further disbursement of loans by NIRSAL to farmers was contained in a correspondence of March 10, following the February 24 meeting where the decision to suspend further loan disbursements was reached.
The memo from the CBN said the suspension would only be reversed after all outstanding loans disbursed to farmers through NIRSAL were paid.
It would be recalled that over 800,000 applicants have complained that they were not able to access the N150 billion Targeted Credit Facility (TCF) stimulus package announced by the CBN in March 2020 to help reduce the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic on the economy and businesses and to support households and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) that have been affected by the pandemic.
NIRSAL was mandated to disburse the TCF funds, in which, again, it failed to handle effectively.
However, President of the All-Farmer Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Kabiru Ibrahim, in his reaction to the suspension, urged the CBN to do the needful by ensuring that all those involved in the shady act were punished.
He said: “We urge the CBN to do due diligence in prequalifying farmers who participate in the programme because several cases of briefcase farmers who pose as real farmers abound. These collude with some NIRSAL officials to defraud the programme.”
