MFB heightens financial inclusion of women entrepreneurs

Fortis Micro-finance Bank, a foremost micro-finance bank, is fostering financial inclusion of more women in rural and semi-urban centres with its mobile money banking.

Fortis Micro-finance Bank, which has 60, 000 rural and semi-urban women in the Federal Capital Territory in its financial services, is reaching out to more women as it awards 20, 000 women certificate of training obtained in its modern financial services that would launch them into financial inclusion more appropriately.

This, according to Henry Nwawuba, the bank’s director for mobile banking, is geared towards including more rural women in its financial services and creating a platform for them away from poverty.

Nwanwuba confirmed this at the bank’s first “women fair” in Abuja recently in the bank’s celebration of successes and financial improvements of its rural and semi-urban women as it prepared grounds for better successes.

Meanwhile, Kunle Okekitun, the bank’s managing director, also confirmed that the signing of five- year unsecured loan on Friday with the Development Bank of the Netherlands would improve access to finance for businesses and financial services.

“The support we have had from a development financial institution in the country is with the Bank of industry (BoI), but now the Deutch Entrepreneur Development Bank would prepare the ground for better financial services for our clients,” Okekitun said.

Before then, Kingsley Muoghalu, deputy governor, Central Bank of Nigeria, in charge of the bank’s financial stability who had been a champion for the financial inclusion of mostly micro-finance banks in the country, had insisted that: “The main reason for the financial inclusion is the promise it holds in addressing global inequality, under-development and welfare. It is believed that when everybody in the world has access to financial services, their joint contributions to the entire development process would create faster and more quantitative impact.”

Also, Simeon Kenny of the British Department for International Development, partner at the event, said that as long as poverty still persisted in Nigeria, women remain veritable tool for overcoming poverty as they form the necessary link for economic emancipation in the community and country at large.

By: Harrison Edeh