According to President Muhammadu Buhari, the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the world economy and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine both had the potential to destabilize the Nigerian financial industry if the sector’s regulators had not been so creative.
Speaking Wednesday in Abuja at the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria’s (CIBN) 15th annual banking and finance conference, Buhari singled out the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) Governor, Godwin Emefiele, and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation for praise (NDIC),
Thanks to the rigorous work of the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC), the National Insurance Commission, and other important players, the nation’s financial system is now stable.
The President assured the entire banking and finance community that the government would continue to support the sector in all appropriate ways to ensure that the sector continues to deliver on its mandates while creating value innovation for its customers. The President was represented by Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed.
As he pointed out, Nigerians urgently require a future Nigeria that builds on its strengths, competencies, and cultural diversity to address issues like climate change, pandemics, and insecurity. According to Buhari, “government will continue to formulate and implement policies that are aimed at promoting self-sustenance in critical areas such as energy, agriculture, health, and technologies.”
Buhari added that his administration has supported the repositioning of the Nigerian economy within a developing Glocal (global and local) environment over the past seven years through a number of initiatives.
He emphasized that the current efforts would be sustained and expanded to more areas of the economy while mentioning such initiatives as the government’s support for Nigeria’s creative industry, indigenous small and medium-sized businesses, and the agricultural sector, which have improved the capacity of indigenous enterprises to compete with their counterparts from other countries.
“There has been a lot of talk about closing branches in the rural areas and be more efficient, but I think what is needed at this time is re-branching of banks into smaller entities such as rural branches that are targeted at meeting the banking needs of rural dwellers,” said Farouk Gumel, chairman of Union Bank, who gave the keynote address. Instead of large branches, we now need more nimble ones that are designed to meet the specific banking needs of rural residents, most of whom are farmers.
Gumel emphasized that during the past six years, significant effort has been achieved to bring banking to rural areas.
“In the last few decades, the talks have centred around food, agriculture, farmers, and the fintech sub-sector. I think there has been a lot of awareness and that has led to a lot of interest and investment. People always talk about revolution, but I think it is more of evolution. It is difficult to change the attitudes of people overnight. Changing behaviours takes time and a lot of effort. So, expectations have to be managed while we work gradually to where we want to be.”
Ken Opara, the Institute’s president and council chairman, made the argument that innovation is bringing forth new methods of doing things that are reshaping the financial services sector more than ever.
He added: “As a result of the dynamics, the financial services sector will need to adapt to this change much faster. Services, products and technological developments that were new and useful yesterday will no longer be necessary today. It is a statement of fact that the financial services sector has continued to change in the last few years than in any other time in history.”
He noted that the financial services sector will need to explore innovation and restructure its operations to succeed in the future as the globe continues to change.
