THE National Vice President of Mobile Money and Bank Association of Nigeria (MMBAN), Obiora Oti, said money wallet bankers would improve their capitalisation and liquidity if the government included them as facilitators in the conditional cash transfer scheme.
Oti told The ICIR exclusively on Wednesday, November 8, that many young people involved in the money wallet business could be supported with a seed capital of about N50,000 and become part of the Federal Government’s cash transfer scheme.
This development, he said, would ensure enough liquidity for them to stay in business since many of them have undergone financial inclusion training under the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) policy guidelines.
Oti recalled how he supported someone with seed money of N20,000 in 2020, during the COVID year, and how the person has become an aggregator and now manages N15,000,000 capital.
“This is how financial inclusion works, and it is one of the fastest ways of removing people from poverty,” he said.
“Typically, you don’t grow the gross domestic product (GDP) by throwing money to people through interventions. When there is a channel for such distribution, it stimulates the economy’s growth,” he added.
He also argued that empowering money wallet agents was a sure way of driving Nigeria’s financial inclusion and economic base.
According to Oti, Nigeria has many lessons from Kenya in its financial inclusion success story because of the Kenyan government’s involvement and facilitation through policy direction and incentives to operatives.
Agency banking allows customers to deposit and withdraw money instead of going to the bank or using automated teller machines (ATMs.)
Currently, there is one agency banking agent for every 80 Nigerians and one bank branch for every 27,000, according to a 2023 report on the Nigerian Financial Services Market.
Harrison Edeh is a journalist with the International Centre for Investigative Reporting, always determined to drive advocacy for good governance through holding public officials and businesses accountable.