By Nike Popoola   Monday, 13 Sep 2010

 

There is need to ensure that the N200bn fund being disbursed by the Bank of Industry for the revival of the manufacturing sector is used for the purpose for which it is intended.

The Registrar and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Credit Administration, Dr. Chris Onalo, said this while speaking with our correspondent.

He said, ”The BoI should set up a strategy to appraise the manufacturing sector, in order to prevent situations were people may divert it to other purposes or use it to settle old debts.”

Onalo said, “BoI should put a pragmatic process in place to ascertain the legitimacy of the claims in the manufacturing sector so as to avoid a scenario, where the funds would be drained.”

He urged BoI to be discreet, transparent, free of political interference and passionate about supporting the industrialisation dream.

While emphasising the need to ensure that small and medium scale industries have assess to loans to finance their development, he observed that oftentimes, they lacked the collateral to get these loans from the banks.

In order to ensure that they were not neglected, Onalo said that the government should stand as a guarantor for the SMEs, who have viable projects.

He said, ”Let the government set up an institution to guarantee itself as a guarantor to the lending institution.”

Source: The Punch