The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) has within 31 years delivered 39,000 new homes under the National Housing Fund (NHF) scheme, the bank’s Managing Director/Chief Executive, Mr Shehu Osidi, has disclosed.
In a paper titled “Financing the Housing We Need: A New Dawn at FMBN as an Institutional Enabler’’, which he presented at the ongoing 18th Africa International Housing Show yesterday (Wednesday, July 24) in Abuja, Osidi said: “Since its re-establishment in 1993, the Bank has delivered about 39,000 new homes, about 25,500 mortgages, and over 120,000 micro-housing loans, all within a single-digit interest rate lending regime.
“Under the National Housing Fund (NHF) Scheme, it has registered 26,350 organisations and over 5.8 million cumulative contributors, with over 1 million accounting for the self-employed sector.
“The Bank has disbursed the cumulative sum of N440 billion under its various loan windows to drive affordable housing finance for the Nigerian economy.
“To its record, the sum of N84.8 billion has been refunded to 492,604 contributors who exited the scheme in line with the provisions of the NHF Act.’’
According to him, the bank initiated constructive engagement with the Federal Ministry of Finance with a view to securing refunds of the wrongful deductions of NHF contributions misconstrued as revenue under the 40 percent deduction regime of revenue accruing to federal agencies.
“This led to the recovery of 12 billion Naira out of the outstanding 19 billion into the Bank’s coffers,” Sidi enthused.
“We are still engaging relevant authorities until the deductions are stopped and we recover the outstanding balance of the trapped NHF funds.’’
He disclosed that the bank has expanded its bouquet of loans from mortgage financing to housing construction to micro-housing financing and, more recently, a rent-to-own product over these years, noting that with the rapidly changing landscape and growing need for affordable housing financing, FMBN’s clientele base has widened from solely primary mortgage banks to private and public real estate developers, housing cooperatives, and now to individual NHF contributors for home self-construction.
The latest additions to FMBN’s loan products are the Home Improvement and Rent Assistance loans, which are micro-housing loans specifically intended for but not exclusive to the non-salaried informal sector, Sidi added.
“Though these numbers may seem modest in the face of the yawning gaps in the housing sector, FMBN has not failed to be a major contributor to the development of the sector.
“The current Executive Management desires to transform FMBN into an institution that delivers on its promises and is responsive to the yearnings and aspirations of its stakeholders.
“These include, contributors, loan beneficiaries, regulators, partners, as well as staff,’’ he said.
Osidi said that after careful and critical examination of the bank and where it needs to be in the near future, the new executive management unveiled a seven-point agenda on assumption of office in February.
“This included, recalibrating the FMBN automation process to fully exploit all that technology can offer across all our business processes,” he said, explaining that it also includes promoting cost-efficiency, enhancing credit quality, reducing non-performing loans, effective project management, and expanding strategic partnerships.
Others, he said, are enthroning a robust organisation and employee performance management system and standardizing capacity building and talent management.
“We recognise the place of human resources in transforming organizations, and accordingly, this management will be deliberate in the way we approach our capacity-building efforts and training programmes,” Sidi stressed.
“We will also try as much as the system permits to put round pegs in round holes, as well as be deliberate on the issue of succession planning.”
To the employees of the bank and those already working with it, Sidi said his management team would “make FMBN a good place to work and fulfil employee’s aspirations,” enthusing that the bank has consistently served the needs of the Nigerian populace within the limits of its resources and would continue to do so in line with its mandate. (NAN)
