Infrastructural dev: Facilitate PPP – Bank directors urged

ECONOMIC experts, Mrs. Ngozi Edozien and Ayo Gbeleyi have urged bank directors in Nigeria to rally support for their banks in their bid to encourage public infrastructure development through public and private partnership project financing.

Speaking at the just concluded annual stakeholders conference of Banks Directors Association of Nigeria ( BDAN), Mrs Edozien who is the chief executive officer of Actis, said banking is one of the fastest growing economies in the continent of Africa and in the world and what the directors have to do is to support that growth with the infrastructure development in Nigeria which is critical to the further growth of the nation’s economy

“Banks have been at the forefront of nation building because that is what we are doing, in supporting public infrastructure development through public and private partnership project financing. We have always been significant in the growth of the economy and in Nigeria. As banks’ directors, I think we have a major role to play in influencing how we work with the states and federal government and how we access debts in the capital markets and how we support projects that are going to drive this economy,” she said .

Ayo Gbeleyi who is the Lagos State Commissioner for Finance regretted that Nigerian banks are living up to expectation in lending to public private partnership projects in the country.

Gbeleyi said in the PPP market today, Nigeria needs capacity for risks management and capacity for long term financing adding that the issue of credit rating is also quite fundamental.