CBN Disburses COVID-19 Funds For NIRSAL Through NAMBUIT Platform

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)  is disbursing the N50bn COVID-19 Targeted Credit Facility to support Households and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) affected by the pandemic through the Integrated National Association of Microfinance Banks Unified IT Platform (NAMBUIT) deployed by Inlaks for NIRSAL Microfinance Bank.

The NIRSAL National MFB is an initiative of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), in collaboration with other major stakeholders like the Bankers Committee, Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL), and the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST). The purpose of the bank is to complement the efforts of the CBN towards addressing the needs of Nigerians at the bottom of the pyramid and deepen financial inclusion.

NAMBUIT is a unified information technology built by Inlaks to service Microfinance banks on behalf of CBN and NAMBs. It aims to enhance financial access, inclusion and sustainability of the microfinance institutions on value chain financing and ensure the growth of the small and medium scale enterprises. The NAMBUIT Platform is enriched with a sophisticated Loan module for the management of the total life cycle of the over 80,000 loans that will be disbursed for this scheme.

The NAMBUIT platform runs on Temenos T24 Inclusive Banking Suite (IBS), and implementation is being managed by Inlaks, a system integrator in Sub-Saharan Africa, in line with global best practices, with support from the CBN.

According to Mr Femi Adeoti, Inlaks Managing Director/CEO, African Operations, 54 branches of NIRSAL MFB are currently connected on the platform.

“NAMBUIT is Software as a Service (SaaS) platform that reduces operational costs as well as improves the bank’s ability to provide necessary information to agencies such as CBN and NDIC. The unified platform comprises a core banking system and sub-systems for agent banking, non-interest banking, and mobile payment among other services.

“A core benefit of the NAMBUIT platform is the smooth on-boarding of the microfinance banks (MFBs) into the national payment system lowering the operating costs of MFBs significantly. This has been significant, especially in the context of developing economies, where many low-income households and micro-enterprises do not have ready access to financial services.”

The CBN had introduced the N50bn Targeted Credit Facility as a stimulus package to support households and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The N50bn intervention is financed from the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Fund. The loan amount is determined based on the activity, cash flow and industry size of the beneficiary, subject to a maximum of N25m for SMEs. Households with verifiable evidence of livelihood adversely impacted by COVID-19 can access the loan to a maximum of N3m.