Heritage Bank Helps Farmers Stabilize Inputs Supply to Agro-Processors

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By Aduragbemi Omiyale
One of the most innovative service providers in Nigeria, Heritage Bank Plc, has praised itself for doing everything within its power to address the country’s food insecurity.
According to the Managing Director of the bank, Mr Akinola George-Taylor, the company has continued to support farmers in the country through the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
In November 2015, President Muhammadu launched the ABP, an initiative designed to boost agricultural production, improve foreign exchange and reverse Nigeria’s negative balance of trade on food.
Since its inception, more than 4.8 million farmers have benefitted from it through the provision of credit facilities via financial institutions, including Heritage Bank.
Recently, at the Bankers’ Award Night organised and held by the CBN Bankers’ Committee in Abeokuta, Heritage Bank was announced as the debut winner of the Best Supporting Bank with CBN’s Information on ABP for its robust publications of information in the media space on the several feats around the programme.
The apex bank also noted that Heritage Bank has continued to be a key financial partner that is creating economic linkages with small farmers and reputable large-scale processors, with a view of increasing agricultural output and significantly improving the capacity utilization of processors.
While commenting on the recognition, Mr George-Taylor said, “The award reflects our strong business fundamentals, resilience, and commitment to transforming Nigeria’s agricultural value chain.
“With the support of the bank, we have helped farmers boost the production of commodities and stabilise inputs supply to agro-processors which has helped in addressing the country’s food insecurity.”
“As a strategic partner that is complementing the efforts of CBN and other stakeholders in the agric sector, we have continued to communicate the broad objectives of ABP.
“The bank has focused on increasing finance to the agricultural sector, the creation of new generations of farmers/entrepreneurs, and growing employment rates. This has led to the reduction of agricultural commodity importation and conservation of external reserves, and the assistance of rural smallholder farmers to grow to commercial production levels, amongst others,” he added.
Heritage Bank has remained the pioneer bank in financing the first ever large-scale rain-fed wheat production in Nigeria and is a prominent participating financial institution (PFI) under CBN’s ABP scheme.
The lender, in partnership with CBN, has also disbursed N41 billion to farmers from 14 states for the expansion of wheat production.
Access Bank Determined to Expand Footprint in Kenya Despite Setback in Sidian Bank Acquisition
Zenith Bank Blames Chiamaka Agim for Disappearance of N4m from Account
Aduragbemi Omiyale is a journalist with Business Post Nigeria, who has passion for news writing. In her leisure time, she loves to read.
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By Aduragbemi Omiyale
Despite efforts by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to reduce the value of unclaimed dividends in the Nigerian capital market, the amount keeps swelling every year.
A report by Daily Trust said in the first nine months of 2022, the value of unclaimed dividends in four of the five tier-one banks in the country increased by N5.6 billion.
Zenith Bank, United Bank for Africa, GTCO, Access Holdings, and FBN Holdings, collectively coined as ZUGAF by Business Post, are the big banks in Nigeria, accounting for about 70 per cent of the market share of the nation’s banking industry.
In the report, it was disclosed that the unclaimed dividends in the big lenders, excluding GTBank, jumped to N92.7 billion from N87 billion.
According to the platform, the unclaimed dividends in GTCO were not captured by the company did not give details of them in the third quarter earnings released in late 2022.
The figures of unclaimed dividends in Zenith Bank remained unchanged at N28.6 billion, but the uncollected cash rewards to shareholders in UBA jumped to N12.6 billion from N11.4 billion, with Access Bank growing to N36.8 billion from N34.9 billion, and First Bank rising to N14.6 billion from N11.9 billion.
Recall that as part of its determination to reduce the fallow investors’ funds, which the federal government moved to take from for running the country, SEC introduced an electronic-dividend registration, which allows companies to pay the cash reward directly into the bank accounts of shareholders.
It also mandated listed firms to promote the use of the e-dividend platform at their annual general meetings (AGMs) and others.
According to SEC, the apex regulatory agency in the country’s capital market, the total amount of unclaimed dividends as of December 31, 2021, stood at N180 billion.
Last month, the Director-General of SEC, Mr Lamido Yuguda, said the commission would rebuild the e-Dividend Management Mandate System (e-DMMS) platform to increase the number of mandated investors on the system.
“The reason why the number may not be reducing as expected is that many investors have not mandated their accounts. Dividends are now distributed electronically, so dividends go directly into the investor’s account, and if everybody mandates their accounts, there would be few unclaimed dividends in the system.
“This process is still open and can be done with the registrars, forms can be obtained from the banks, too, and it’s a very simple process. We also have on our website a tool that assists investors in determining any unclaimed dividends that they have. And I would encourage everyone to take advantage of these tools or to speak to the complaints section of the SEC directly, and we would guide that person appropriately,” he stated.
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By Aduragbemi Omiyale
A top financial institution in Nigeria, Access Bank Plc, has reassured stakeholders that it would continue to explore ways to expand its footprint in Kenya despite its inability to complete the merger with Sidian Bank in Kenya.
Last week, Business Post reported that the largest lender in sub-Saharan Africa pulled out of the deal after both parties could not iron out some issues regarding the acquisition.
Access Bank was planning to acquire the entire 83.4 per cent shareholding held by an investment company, Centum, in Sidian Bank Limited.
“Although regulators have all been supportive in engagements around the transaction, certain conditions precedent, including those required of Sidian Bank, which were needed to prudently complete the transaction have not been met, and the parties were unable to reach an agreement on the variation of these conditions in a manner to deliver the desired outcome for the parties.
“Consequently, we hereby notify the Nigerian Exchange Ltd and the investing public that the Sidian acquisition will no longer be completed by the bank,” a notice to the NGX by Access Holdings Plc, the parent firm of Access Bank, had stated last week.
But despite the setback in the transaction, the lender emphasised that it would not affect its drive to promote regional trade finance and other cross-border banking services in the East African Community (EAC) and broader COMESA region as it works towards its vision to be Africa’s gateway to the world.
“The bank remains committed to growing its franchise in a safe and sound manner in Kenya and the broader East African Community and will continue to explore a variety of organic and inorganic opportunities to grow its market share therein,” the statement, signed by Sunday Ekwochi, Company Secretary of Access Holdings PLC, read.
Recall that Access Bank already made a strategic entry into the highly-competitive Kenyan financial ecosystem through the acquisition of Transnational Bank Plc of Kenya (now Access Bank Kenya) in 2020.
Another notable strategic expansion executed by Access Bank in recent years was the acquisition of the defunct Diamond Bank Plc in 2018, a process completed in 2019. In 2021 the bank announced the acquisition of Cavmont Bank Limited and merged its existing operations in Zambia following the acquisition
It also completed the acquisition of Grobank of South Africa in 2021, and in the same year, completed the acquisition of about 78.15 per cent holding in African Banking Corporation of Botswana Limited.
Access Bank’s expansion drive promises great value for stakeholders and presents enormous opportunities to support the growth of the trade and payment ecosystem.
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By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The customer of Zenith Bank, Ms Chiamaka Agim, who posted a video on social media of the disappearance of about N4 million from her account, has been blamed for her ordeal.
The video posted by Ms Agim on Tuesday, January 13, 2023, generated reactions on the internet and prompted Zenith Bank to launch an investigation into the matter.
Revealing the outcome of its probe, Zenith Bank said Ms Agim, who claimed to be a former employee of the company, was careless with her phone as it was discovered that her funds were moved from her registered device, which indicates that she must have authorised the transactions or someone had access to her phone to carry out the transfers.
According to Zenith Bank, Ms Agim at no time reported to the bank or the police that her phone was stolen, showing that someone close to her had access to the device to move her funds.
In a two-page investigative report sent to her, it was revealed to the customer how her details were compromised using the same device she has used to carry out mobile banking transactions in the past, which was never repudiated by the complainant.
“Prior to the fraudulent withdrawals, we did not receive any information that you compromised your banking details.
“The bank has in place an emergency USSD Code *996*911# for customers to dial and restrict their account from any mobile phone when they suspect their account has been compromised or lose their phones.
“If your claim of that the transactions were not authorized by you is true, it means that somebody had unrestricted access to your phone,” a part of the report read.
It was further revealed that Ms Agim was assigned a token on November 21, 2021, at 01:38:21 pm, and 4-digit PIN was created by her (as revealed in the attached material) and that she has been using it to consummate several mobile banking in the past.
Furthermore, the response letter signed by the Internal Control Unit of Zenith Bank noted it could only recover a sum of N800,500 out of the missing sum and advised her on the need to get a court order to repatriate N800,500 from Access Bank Plc.
Zenith Bank has advised her to report the matter to the Special Fraud Unit (SFU) of the Nigeria Police Force to help apprehend the culprits.

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