Mike Daramola, a trader who deals in soaps and detergents at Sabo market, Ikorodu, Lagos, knew that the sum of N10,000, which the Federal Government was giving out in the first phase of the TraderMoni scheme, would not do much to boost his business; still, he had so much expectations and hope in the programme.
TraderMoni, a collateral-free loan targeted at petty traders and artisans, is part of the National Social Investment Programme, under the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme, through which the Federal Government says it intends to bridge the credit gap and empower Nigerians at the grassroots.
Beneficiaries of TraderMoni, which is being coordinated by the Bank of Industry and the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme, a unit in the Office of the Vice President, have six months to repay the loan with flexible options of N85 daily or N430 weekly.
The beneficiaries, who receive an initial loan of N10,000, will qualify to obtain further loans of N15,000, N20,000 and N50,000 if they don’t default in repaying the facility.
Daramola’s intention was to put in his best in order to meet up with the repayment schedule, so as to qualify to obtain the maximum loan amount, which he believes would significantly boost his small-scale business.
A graduate of Food Science from the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Daramola had ventured into petty trading, after quitting his previous job. According to him, he left the job due to the ‘very poor pay’ that was not commensurate with the long hours he had to put in.
But Daramola’s high hopes in TraderMoni crashed, when, on qualifying to receive the initial N10,000 loan, he only got the sum of N8,000 – N2,000 less than the amount promised by the Federal Government. Disappointed, and worried about how he would still be expected to repay N10,000, according to the requirements of the scheme, Daramola took to the social media to voice his complaints.
In a post on his Twitter handle, @DaramolaMike22, he wrote, “So I received the #TraderMoni by #FG today, but to my surprise, the officials gave out N8,000 instead of N10,000 which means they deducted N2,000 each from everyone who got the money. How do we make Nigeria work with such acts? @DrJoeAbah, @ProfOsinbajo, @segalink, @feladurotoye.”
Daramola was not the only one to be short-changed in the TraderMoni scheme, as discovered in further investigations by our correspondent. Many other beneficiaries, all petty traders, had N2,000 deducted from the ‘loan’ extended to them by the Federal Government.
Our correspondent discovered that the ‘deductions’ were rampant among the beneficiaries in Sabo market, Ikorodu, where Daromola has his soap and detergent shop. He could not hide his disappointment in the TraderMoni scheme when our correspondent spoke with him at the market on Wednesday.
He explained that no reason was given for the N2,000 deductions.
From investigations, it was learnt that the agents, who came to the market to disburse the loan to beneficiaries, initially collected N2,000 cash from each beneficiary before transferring N10,000 to their bank accounts. But later, they stopped collecting N2,000 cash from beneficiaries and transferred just the sum of N8,000 to them.
The cash transfers were made through the Eyowo app, which enables users to send or receive money and make other transactions with their phone number, with or without a bank account.
Narrating how he got involved in the TraderMoni scheme, Daramola told our correspondent, “What happened was that their agents came to the market to sensitise traders about the scheme. That was how I got to know about it. Actually, I know the initial loan of N10,000 cannot do much for my business, but my target was to be able to repay the loan on schedule so as to qualify for the larger loans, which will help me to grow my business.
“The agents took our names and phone numbers and told us that we would get a message from them if we were successful.
“After about two months, I got a message that I had qualified to receive the loan. Many other traders in the market (Sabo market, Ikorodu) also got the same message.
“When the agents came to pay us the money, they asked us to show the message they sent to us before we could receive the money.
“We already knew it was N10,000 because that was what they told us when they came to sensitise us about the TraderMoni scheme and we had also heard in the news that that was the amount the government was giving out as loan to petty traders, so we were expecting N10,000.
“Initially, when the agents want to pay people, before they transfer N10,000 to anybody, they will first collect N2,000 cash from the beneficiary. They were collecting N2,000 cash before transferring N10,000, which means what they were giving out to beneficiaries in the market was N8,000.
“But after doing that for the first two days they came to disburse the loans, they stopped collecting N2,000 cash and instead just transferred N8,000 to the beneficiaries.”
Daramola fell among the group that received cash transfers of N8,000, as indicated in the TraderMoni credit alert he showed to our correspondent. No explanation was given for the deduction of N2,000 from the loan; meanwhile, they are still expected to repay N10,000.
Several other traders in Sabo market corroborated Daramola’s account, having had the same experience.
For instance, another beneficiary, a petty trader who simply identified himself as Jude, said he also received N8,000. Jude also showed our correspondent the alert, which indicated a payment of N8,000 to his bank account through the Eyowo app. Like Daramola, Jude was hoping to grow his general goods business through the TraderMoni loan.
“I think the government is not really serious with the way it is going about the disbursement. I’m afraid the objective will not be achieved,” he told our correspondent.
Also speaking with our correspondent, a meat seller in the market, Akeem, said he did not mind collecting only N8,000 rather than the expected N10,000, because according to him, it was a gift.
“They just came one day and asked for my number. I gave them. Next thing I knew, they said I had qualified to receive a loan of N10,000 without any collateral. When they came they gave me only N8,000. I did not ask for it so I could not reject it,” he said, adding that he was not concerned about the ‘incomplete amount’.
“I am just happy that I got the N8,000, I don’t know who took the remaining N2,000 and I don’t really want to know,” he added.
Another beneficiary, who did not wish to be named, admitted parting with N2,000 cash before he received a transfer of N10,000 from the agents.
Our correspondent observed that most of the beneficiaries in the market, who had N2,000 deducted from the money given to them, were not willing to disclose their identities when speaking about the matter.
Apart from Daramola’s post on the social media, hardly any protest or complaint was recorded as a result of the deductions.
However, reacting to our correspondent’s surprise at the silence surrounding the development, Daramola explained that most of the beneficiaries would not want to complain because they never intended to repay the loan, as stipulated in the TraderMoni scheme.
According to him, the prevailing belief among most of the beneficiaries in the market was that the cash was simply a windfall – their own share of the national cake. That mindset, according to him, informed their readiness to give up N2,000 in order to receive N8,000, without complaining.
Daramola said, “Many people turned a blind eye because they felt they should just collect their own share of the national cake.”
Asked how he got to know that some of the beneficiaries were not interested in paying back the loan, he said, “Remember that I am in the market – there is nothing that goes on around here that I don’t know about. I can tell you categorically that most people don’t intend to pay back. That was why they eagerly gave up N2,000 to the agents.”
Daramola’s claim that most of the beneficiaries were not interested in repaying the loan was confirmed by another trader in Sabo market. After refusing to disclose his identity, the man, who said he also benefited from the scheme, told our correspondent that he had no plans of paying back.
“I have since spent the money. How much is N8,000? What can it do for my business? Even if I had collected the N10,000, it would still not do much for me,” the man said.
“Even the agents that came to give us the money do not seem to be interested in whether we would repay the loan or not. They did not talk much about it. Even if I want to pay back, I don’t know how I will go about it,” the trader added.
Daramola said he initially wanted to speak out in protest at the market, when he received the credit alert of N8,000 from the agents, instead of N10,000, as expected. But, according to him, he felt that most of the other traders would have reprimanded him, or even beaten him up, for ‘spoiling the deal’, if he had done that. As a result, he opted to voice out his grievances through the social media. t
The trader further explained that his complaint was informed by his intention to actually repay the loan, and qualify for larger amounts, in order to grow his fledgling petty business.
He added, “If I had complained there and then at the market when I received the transfer of N8,000 so many people would have taken offence. But I really had so much hope in the scheme, I was expecting to use it to grow my business so when I received N8,000, I was disappointed and confused. That was why I went to the social media to complain.
“How can I now repay N10,000 when all I got was N8,000? If I pay back N10,000, I would be the one losing.
“In my line of business, if I buy goods worth N10,000, my profit will be just N250 by the time I have finished selling them. So how will I now collect N8,000 and expect to pay N10,000 when my profit is not even up to the N2,000 I am adding to their money?”
Interestingly, Daramola, who included his mobile telephone number in the complaint he made on Twitter, said he got phone calls from representatives of the Bank of Industry and Eyowo, the company whose app is being used to disburse the loans after his post went viral.
He said, “The person that called from Bank of Industry said that they discovered that the deducted N2,000 was being transferred to a Diamond Bank account. They said they were tracking down the owner of the account.”
Daramola said he did not hear from BOI again concerning the development.
He added that a representative of Eyowo got in touch with him over the matter.
Further checks by our correspondent revealed that similar deductions were recorded among beneficiaries in some other markets in Lagos, particularly in the Mushin and Oyingbo areas. In both areas, it was alleged that some traders who were ‘sponsored’ or ‘brought into the scheme’ by the market leaders received even less than N8,000, in cash from the said market leaders, who reportedly received the loans from the agents on behalf of the beneficiaries.
Efforts to track down the said agents, who disbursed N8,000 instead of N10,000 to beneficiaries at Sabo market and other areas, were not successful. The traders who were affected by the development told our correspondent that they didn’t have the contacts of the concerned agents.
The Federal Government has said that the TraderMoni scheme will empower the masses, particularly petty traders, to enable them to become economically independent.
According to BOI, the scheme is targeted at two million petty traders across the country, with a minimum of 30,000 loans per state, including the Federal Capital Territory. But Daramola doubted the realisation of the objectives of the scheme, considering the irregularities recorded in the disbursement of the loans.
“When I heard about the programme I was so hopeful because it sounded so genuine – for somebody like me, it would not be so difficult to repay N10,000 loan and qualify for higher amounts. But the way it has turned out, I don’t think it is genuine, I don’t think it will make any impact,” he noted.
However, the Federal Government was not forthcoming on the development.
Although a Federal Government official admitted knowledge of the deductions, clear answers were not provided to our correspondent’s inquiries concerning what had been done about the matter.
An official of the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme, a unit in the Office of the Vice President which handles the TraderMoni scheme in collaboration with the Bank of Industry, Mr Uzoma Nwagba, told our correspondent that the issue had been addressed.
When our correspondent asked what the government has done, or is doing about the deductions, Nwagba said, “It is addressed. Completely.”
Nwagba, who spoke to our correspondent in a WhatsApp conversation on Thursday, however, said he was not disposed to say more at that moment and told our correspondent to call back later in the day.
But further calls to Nwagba’s mobile telephone, in a bid to get further details of how the matter was addressed, were not answered. Subsequent messages sent to him on WhatsApp were also not replied.
It was not clear in what manner the Federal Government ‘addressed’ the issue of the deductions but the traders affected by the development told our correspondent that they were not aware of whatever the government did, as they had not been refunded the deducted N2,000, nor were they informed of any planned refund.
History of irregularities in government schemes
The ‘irregularities’ recorded in the TraderMoni scheme mirror similar challenges that marred previous economic and social intervention programmes in the country, a development which economists identify as one of the reasons Nigeria is currently rated as the ‘poverty capital’ of the world.
Indeed, a recent report by the Brookings Institution rated Nigeria as the country with the ‘highest number of extremely poor people’, with the number of Nigerians in extreme poverty increasing by six people every minute.
Interestingly, the Federal Government of Nigeria had, over the years, implemented various socio-economic empowerment schemes, which were ostensibly aimed at alleviating and eradicating poverty in the country.
The Better Life Programme for Rural Women, or BLP, was initiated in September 1987 by the late Maryam Babangida, wife of the then military Head of State, President Ibrahim Babangida. The programme was aimed at reducing the country’s high maternal and child mortality rate by increasing basic healthcare facilities for women, providing income generating opportunities in agriculture and cottage industries, integrating rural women into national development plans and developing educational training for women.
However, there was no budgetary allocation for the funding of BLP, and as a result, funds allocated to several projects were not accounted for. Eventually, the programme was regarded by the public as nothing more than a public relations gambit for the then First Lady.
The programme was discontinued after a change of government.
Several irregularities were recorded in SURE-P, a socio-economic intervention programme launched in 2012 by the President Goodluck Jonathan-led administration following the nationwide protests that greeted the removal of petroleum subsidy.
Billions of dollars were allocated for SURE-P from resources that accrued to the Federal Government as savings from the partial removal of fuel subsidy. Among the objectives of the programme, according to the Federal Government, are mitigating the immediate impact of the partial petroleum subsidy removal on the population by laying a foundation for the successful development of a national safety net programme that targets the poor and vulnerable on a continuous basis.
Also, SURE-P was expected to accelerate economic transformation through investments in critical infrastructural projects, so as to drive economic growth, achieve the Vision 20:2020 Programme, and promote investment in the petroleum downstream sector.
By the time SURE-P was scrapped by the President Muhammadu Buhari administration in 2015, beneficiaries of the programme – which was intended to engage about 5,000 youths in each state of the federation, who would be paid stipends monthly, before subsequently gaining permanent employment – had become disillusioned to the extent that they experienced more of exploitation than benefits from their participation in the scheme.
The SURE-P beneficiaries, who were mostly engaged as traffic management officers and sanitation workers, among others, complained of ‘abandonment’ by the Federal Government, leading to several months without pay.
A beneficiary of the defunct SURE-P scheme in Bayelsa State, who simply identified himself as Sampson, told our correspondent that about 3,000 beneficiaries in the state were being owed for more than a year by the time the programme was scrapped.
Sampson, who is still feeling bitter about the experience, noted that the beneficiaries had to take their plight to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
“After being unemployed for a number of years after graduation from the university, I was filled with high hopes when I was selected among the beneficiaries in the SURE-P scheme. I saw it as a foundation of greater things to come. But I was disappointed, at a point they simply abandoned us – they stopped paying our stipends and the promise of a permanent job became a mirage,” Sampson, who returned to the labour market, where he is still looking for a job, after the programme was scrapped, told our correspondent.
Another SURE-P beneficiary from Imo State, who only identified himself as Iwunze, described his experience in the scheme as ‘exploitation’.
“We were working without pay – the stipend stopped coming at a point but unknown to us, some politicians, who recommended us for the programme, were feeding fat on our toils. We also learnt that the officials of the scheme were diverting the money. We ended up spending the little we have on the programme. I regretted being part of the experience,” Iwunze said.
The National Poverty Eradication Programme, which replaced the Poverty Alleviation Program in 2001, was designed by the Olusegun Obasanjo-led Federal Government to address ‘absolute’ poverty.
Currently, NAPEP is best remembered for the tricycles, popularly known as ‘Keke NAPEP’, which were introduced to the country as part of the programme. Long after the demise of the National Poverty Alleviation Programme, Keke NAPEP tricycles continue to wax strong as a cheaper, alternative means of public transportation, although the three-legged vehicles have been banned, or restricted, in some cities in the country.
Even without the N2,000 deductions from the amount received by some beneficiaries of the TraderMoni loan scheme, most Nigerians doubt how N10,000 can be used to grow any type of business.
Mr. Ifeanyi Onuka, a businessman, swore that no business would record a significant improvement as a result of mere investment of N10,000.
“The amount is just too small – it is a pittance. There is no way you will give somebody N10,000 to grow their business. It is not possible,” the businessman argued, adding that “Maybe the Federal Government just wanted to share money to the traders”.
Another businessman, John Ileka, echoed Onuka’s assertions. He described the TraderMoni sum as ‘pocket-money’ for those that received it.
“If I had received the money, I would have used it to enjoy myself at a bar. I will take some bottles of beer and pepper-soup – whatever remains, I will keep it as change,” Ileka said.
TraderMoni no enough to alleviate poverty – Economist
An economist, who spoke to our correspondent, observed that the objectives of economic intervention programmes like TraderMoni were not being realised because of ‘insincerity’ on the part of the government in their formulation and implementation.
A developmental economist, Odilim Enwegbara, noted that the amount being given as loan in the TraderMoni scheme was ‘too small’ for the beneficiaries to take the programme seriously.
Enwegbara said most of the beneficiaries would not pay back the loan because it appeared to be a grant. The economist suggested that the programme also appeared like a form of ‘vote-buying’, especially as it was introduced very close to the election period.
He said, “When you give somebody money without collateral, you are giving the impression that the money is a grant – it appears like an indirect way of buying vote
“The fact that it is almost a grant means that the beneficiaries will not be serious about paying back. The amount is too small. If the government is serious about collecting the money back, they would have given out a larger amount of money and requested for collateral; that way, the recipients of the loan will know that they must pay back.”
“What is N10,000? Even the poorest Nigerian will not see N10,000 and overtly rejoice. It appears that there is an ulterior motive behind the loan, maybe it is a way of buying the votes as it is coming very close to the elections,” Enwegbara added.
He spoke of the need to ‘restructure’ the country’s fiscal and monetary policy, if economic empowerment programmes like TraderMoni are to achieve the desired impact.
Continuing, he said, “If you want to solve Nigeria’s problems, first, you have to restructure Nigeria’s fiscal and monetary policy. You can’t just hand people N10,000 and expect them to pay back. If they don’t pay back what will you do?”
Copyright PUNCH.
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