.Says women account for 42.7% of 22,616 Nigerians accessing bank loans for first time

Deji Elumoye in Abuja

The National Credit Guarantee Company (NCGC) has disclosed that it has facilitated N64.13 billion in loans to Nigerian businesses and individuals, as well as supporting about 914,791 direct and indirect jobs in its less than one and half years of operation.
NCGC’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Dr Bonaventure Okhaimo, who made this known on Tuesday at a media parley at the State House, Abuja, also stated that 22,616 Nigerians who had never have access to formal bank credit have secured loans through its intervention, with women accounting for 42.7 per cent of such beneficiaries.
Okhaimo added that the company had also deployed N30.19 billion in credit guarantees to unlock the N64.13 billion in loans as at October 21, 2026.
He said the intervention within 14 months of its operation had enabled participating financial institutions to extend loans to previously excluded businesses and individuals, particularly those unable to meet conventional collateral requirements.
The initiative, Okhaimo explained, has already reached more than 170,000 beneficiaries through 19 participating financial institutions, including commercial and microfinance banks.
“For every one naira that we give as a credit guarantee to a bank, it creates two naira in loans. That’s the additionality”, the CEO stated.
The CEOs stressed that President Tinubu established the company to address a fundamental weakness in Nigeria’s financial system, where otherwise viable businesses were routinely denied credit because they lacked acceptable collateral.
His words: “The President has said, don’t let a viable Nigerian business suffer because it doesn’t have collateral. He has taken the collateral and given it to the bank. So that’s what we are doing”.
Okhaimo also explained that NCGC does not lend directly to businesses or individuals but provides guarantees that encourage financial institutions to extend credit to borrowers they would ordinarily consider too risky.
According to him, the company currently assumes up to 60 per cent of the credit risk on eligible loans, allowing lenders to relax collateral requirements while retaining responsibility for credit assessment, loan monitoring and recovery.
Some banks, he stated, traditionally demand collateral worth more than 150 per cent of the amount being borrowed, a practice that excludes many small businesses despite their commercial viability.
“What we are saying is, forget about collateral. Do the other due diligence. As long as the customer’s business is viable and the customer has good character, we are willing to support by giving you a credit guarantee that will enable you to give loans to your customers”, he stated.
The NCGC boss also disclosed that the company’s interventions had supported 914,791 jobs, comprising direct employment reported by participating banks and indirect employment estimated through recognised development finance multipliers.
The indirect employment calculations, he emphasised, were based on sector-specific multipliers, including those used by the African Development Bank, with NCGC attributing employment impact according to its share of guaranteed credit risk.
Okhaimo described the inclusion of 22,616 first-time borrowers in the formal financial system as particularly significant, noting that many previously depended entirely on family members, friends and informal financing arrangements.
He also disclosed that 7,731 young Nigerians had benefited from guaranteed loans but expressed dissatisfaction with the relatively low level of youth participation.
The CEO said the company was developing strategies to increase the proportion of young beneficiaries to at least 40 per cent, considering the country’s predominantly youthful population.
“We need to encourage them. We need to engage them. We need to do much more around youth empowerment”.
On the company’s women-focused interventions, Okhaimo announced plans to unlock more than N100 billion in financing for over 20,000 women-owned enterprises within five years through its GuaranteeHer initiative.
The scheme, launched on July 29, 2026, and formally unveiled to financial institutions in Lagos on September 3, raises credit guarantee coverage to 70 per cent for eligible women-owned businesses, compared with the standard 60 per cent.
He said the framework, which provides guarantees for loans of up to N50 million per borrower, was designed to strengthen existing women-focused lending programmes operated by financial institutions.
On the high interest rates charged by commercial banks despite government credit guarantees, Okhaimo acknowledged that access to finance and affordability remained two separate challenges.
He explained that NCGC was primarily established to improve access, although its risk-sharing model could progressively reduce borrowing costs.
According to him, banks determine lending rates by considering the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Monetary Policy Rate, inflation, funding costs and additional premiums reflecting the perceived risks associated with individual borrowers.
He said the credit guarantee intervention specifically targeted the risk premium, potentially allowing banks to reduce interest rates as their exposure to possible losses declined.
“We don’t determine the interest rate because we are not the ones lending to you. We are incentivising the banks to lend from their own balance sheets”.
He added that NCGC was working with the Central Bank to explore regulatory capital relief for loans backed by eligible guarantees, a measure that could further encourage lower lending rates.
Okhaimo also stressed that credit guarantees were not grants or free money, insisting that beneficiaries must operate viable businesses and meet their repayment obligations.
He also confirmed that agriculture remained a major beneficiary of the scheme, noting that early interventions involving agricultural aggregators had enabled numerous smallholder farmers in North-Central Nigeria to secure formal loans for the first time.
On the company’s institutional structure, Okhaimo explained that NCGC was established on May 29, 2025, with an initial capitalisation of N100 billion, contributed equally by four federal institutions.
He identified the shareholders as the Bank of Industry, Ministry of Finance Incorporated, Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority and Nigerian Consumer Credit Corporation, each holding 25 per cent.
NCGC, the CEO said, obtained its licence from the Central Bank on August 9, 2025, and operates under the bank’s regulatory supervision, alongside oversight by the Federal Ministry of Finance.
According to him, the company’s capital base provides substantial opportunities to expand credit guarantees and mobilise additional lending in support of President Tinubu’s ambition to build a trillion-dollar economy by 2030.