The Bankers’ Committee has shown support for the increasing significant financial services inclusion for a majority of Nigerians before the end of 2016.
The director, Banking Supervision, Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Tokunbo Martins, who addressed newsmen shortly after the committee’s meeting in Abuja, on Thursday, February 11, said that the committee extensively deliberated on the need for the 170 million Nigerians to have some form of financial inclusion and expressed delight that there has been substantial improvement in that regard.
She said: “A couple of years back, the number of Nigerians financially included are between 30 and 40 per cent, but currently we have 66 per cent (about 57 million) Nigerians financially included, and we hope that before the end of 2016, we would reach our target of 60.5 per cent.”
“If that target is achieved, I think we would have gone a long way to alleviate the sufferings of Nigerians as far as financial inclusion is concerned.”
On the issue of Nigerians resident in the North East, the committee said that they are working on creating more access point in the area through mobile, agency banking, which is expected to take off soon.
The committee, while refuting assumptions that bank charges discourage inclusion, said that they are going to drive a financial literacy awareness so that people can understand what they are being charged for to ensure bank customers get value for what they are charged.
