NEXIM Bank targets 59% growth rate in 2019 –Acting MD

Bello

The Acting Managing Director of Nigerian Export-Import (NEXIM) Bank, Bala Bello, says the bank’s balance sheet size for 2019 is N190.30 billion.

Bello made this known in Abuja on Tuesday when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions to present the bank’s 2019 Budget.

NEXIM is one of the revenue generating agencies of government, expected to defend its Internally Generated Revenue before the national assembly besides the general annual budget.

Bello said the amount indicated a growth of 59.32 per cent when compared to the closing position of N117.65 billion as at Dec. 31, 2018.

According to him, the growth is predicated upon a 150 million dollar line of credit from AFREXIM Bank and N30 billion managed and intervention fund from the Ministry of Finance.

“The growth we started recording since 2018 is a radical departure from the deficit that characterised previous years.

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“Losses were recorded in 2016 and 2017 but we made a profit of N117.65 billion in 2018,” he said.

On Capital Expenditure for 2018, the acting managing director said it was poor due to cumbersome procurement processes.

On loan recoveries, Bello said besides challenges recorded in recovering loans that had existed for over 20 years, called legacy loan, the bank had no problem recovering loans.

“The bank adopted several approaches in recovering debts because of the peculiarity of the debts. While some of the debts are well secured others have weak securities, making recovery a bit difficult.

“In some cases, we use litigation to recover the loans, in other cases, we use security agencies and sometimes we use debt recovery agencies.”

On why the bank budgeted N550 million for staff capacity building, he said the need for thorough and constant training of staff could not be over emphasised, adding that it was necessary because, “artificial intelligence was threatening jobs.

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“We also carry out Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR), to impact on the lives of the people.

“For instance, we have been working with the Presidency, through the Office of the Vice President for over one year on SMEs.

“We have held about 20 trainings and we have annual SMEs awards as well as shared facility centres where most of those who do not have access to facilities nor have collateral bring in their goods and we help them sell locally and internationally,” he said.

The Chairman of the committee, Sen. Rafiu Adebayo, directed the bank to submit details of the 2018 budget performance and 2019 projection for proper scrutiny.

Meanwhile, the Bank of Agriculture was asked to re-appear before the committee as it was not satisfied with its budget presentation.(NAN)

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