The Managing Director of
Infrastructure Bank, Mr Adeleke Oyinloye, has advised Development Finance Institutes (DFIs) in Nigeria to re-evaluate their roles in the nation’s development.
Oyinloye made the call in Lagos during his investiture as Chairman, Association of Nigerian Development Finance Institutions (ANDFI).
He stressed the need for a new advocacy for finance institutions’ sustainable participation in the real sector development and for government’s appreciation of their role.
Mr Oyinloye described DFIs as the engine of economic growth through the provision of long-term finance, expertise and skills.
“You can see the fact that the real sector has not grown as expected. It might also be directly or indirectly traceable to DFIs.
“If we know our roles as DFIs, we double and recommit ourselves; we might be able to impact on the development of the real sector
According to him, when members know and appreciate their mandates, they begin to articulate policies and structure themselves to meet the needs of developing the real sector.
“Nigeria is at a turning point which not only makes demands on us all to contribute our quota, but also creates an opportunity to redirect our energy towards actualising our set goals.
“The tasks before us are enormous, but we must refocus ourselves towards achieving our collective and individual mandates.
“This will naturally give us a platform to further transform ANDFI into a key player to address issues concerning the real sector of the economy,’’ he said.
He pledged that ANDFI would partner governments at the various levels for development and stressed that the partnership would be in the areas of policy formulation and financing of development projects.
Mr Oyinloye urged the various states’ investment companies to seek membership and benefit from ANDFIs’ coordinated development policy and project finance initiatives.
He said that the four development banks: Bank of Agriculture, Bank of Industry, Nigerian Export-Import Bank and Infrastructure Bank were members of ANDFI.
Oyinloye identified one of the challenges facing the association as the absence of internal cohesion as strong partners of government.
The new chairman also pledged to make ANDFI a strong voice in the development of the nation’s real sector.
The immediate past chairman of ANDFI, Dr Mohammed Santuraki, said that Oyinloye’s appointment was significant following the defined role of development finance.
Santuraki, who is the Managing Director of Bank of Agriculture, said that the recent failure in global economy had made allocation of resources for the promotion economic development a challenge.
Santuraki, who was represented by Mr Abiodun Adedeji , an Assistant General Manager, Odu’a Investment Company, said that the Nigeria DFIs were being restructured for partial privatisation and to create mega cross-sectoral wholesale DFIs.
“We believe that all these changes would energise the DFIs’ space in Nigeria.
The association is currently governed by the general assembly, executive council and electoral committee.