Category: Business Day

At about 3am on Wednesday, Uzoma Chukwu woke up to a frightening sight.

Water had entered his home and was rapidly rising.

By the time daylight came, the flood had submerged houses, destroyed household belongings and cut off movement in parts of Akaeze and neighbouring communities in Ivo Local Government Area of Ebonyi State.

For Chukwu and scores of other residents, there was little time to salvage their belongings.

‘Since I was born, I have never experienced this type of flood,’ one of the residents said, describing the volume of water as unprecedented in the community.

The flood, which followed heavy rainfall that began on Tuesday, has displaced no fewer than 134 families, according to an assessment by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ebonyi State.

Rice, yam, potato and other farmlands were submerged, while houses, furniture, bedding, phones and other household possessions were either damaged or completely swept away.

At Amaegbu Umobo, Akaeze, community Chinyere Irem, a farmer said more than 54 victims had already been identified, with several families left without habitable homes.

Among them is Ochude Chukwu, whose residence, popularly known as Udensi House, was pulled down by the flood.

His rice farm and other family property were also destroyed.

With the house no longer habitable, Chukwu said he had been forced to relocate with his wife and three children.

‘I am calling on the government to come and help us and rescue my family from this situation,’ he pleaded.

For Irem, the flood has also brought substantial economic losses.

He said the water destroyed his wife’s belongings, bed, chairs and telephone, while his rice, potato and other crops were also submerged.

Irem, a farmer, estimated his losses at between N8 million and N20 million, stressing that the damage to his farmland was particularly devastating.

‘My rice, yam, my potato, everything was covered by the water,’ he said, appealing to the government for assistance.

The impact was not limited to homes and farms.

Okechukwu Uwaezioke said the flood paralysed vehicular and human movement around Ivo Agbaleka and adjoining communities, while the Ivo Market was also inundated.

‘Even in the market, water entered inside. People from other villages could not come to the market. We need government help,’ he said.

Okpe Favour Chidinma said more than 20 houses were affected in her community, forcing some displaced families to seek alternative accommodation.

The affected communities include Amaegbu Umobo, Umuewodo Ndiachi Umuobo Akaeze and Umuezaka Ezeukwu Akaeze, among others.

As residents count their losses, the immediate response has come from the opposition PDP, whose Chukwuma Igwe, the state chairman, led a delegation to the affected communities on Thursday.

Igwe said Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odii, the party’s 2027 governorship candidate, had released N5 million for immediate assistance to victims.

According to him, N2 million would be deployed to support affected residents in Akaeze, while the remaining N3 million would be used in other communities after further assessment.

He said the party had so far documented about 134 affected families in Akaeze, with the figure expected to increase as assessments continue in other locations.

‘My people, I’m not happy. I don’t have to hide it. It’s a thing of tears that this kind of thing can happen at this time,’ Igwe said.

But he stressed that the party’s intervention could only provide temporary relief, insisting that the major responsibility for disaster response rested with government.

‘We are not in government yet. Our own is to condole with you and sympathise with you. The main intervention is supposed to come from the government,’ he said.

Igwe said the party would also draw the attention of the Federal Government and relevant agencies, including the National Emergency Management Agency, to the plight of the affected residents.

Darlington Onwe, PDP spokesman in Ebonyi, described the incident as a major humanitarian disaster, saying the scale of the destruction required more than immediate relief.

According to him, affected families would need support to rebuild their homes, restore their agricultural livelihoods and recover from the economic losses caused by the disaster.

Felix Ogbonna Igboke, the PDP House of Representatives candidate for Ohanivo Federal Constituency, who was part of the delegation, said the visit was undertaken on Odii’s directive to assess the extent of the damage and provide immediate assistance.

For the residents, however, relief from the immediate hardship is only one part of the problem.

With farms destroyed and homes rendered uninhabitable, many fear that the consequences of the flood will extend beyond the initial disaster.

They are therefore calling on the Ebonyi and Federal governments to provide relief materials and emergency assistance, while undertaking a technical assessment of the affected communities to determine what is driving the flooding.

For families now sleeping outside their homes or seeking temporary accommodation, the appeal is straightforward: they want help to survive the immediate crisis and measures that will prevent them from facing the same disaster again.

Vesta Orchestra invites lovers of theatre, opera, literature and Nigerian culture to experience this new musical interpretation of Soyinka’s classic work.

Following successful performances in May, ‘The Trials of Brother Jero – The Opera’ is set to return to the stage for an encore performance on Sunday, October 11, 2026, at the Wole Soyinka Centre for Culture and the Creative Arts, formerly known as the National Arts Theatre, Iganmu, Lagos.

Produced by Vesta Orchestra, the event begins with a pre-show school concerts at 4:00 p.m. featuring four school orchestras and will be followed by the main opera at 5:00 p.m.

The opera is an adaptation of Nobel Laureate Professor Wole Soyinka’s celebrated satirical play, ‘The Trials of Brother Jero’ (1963). The production reimagines the story of Brother Jeroboam, a charismatic self-proclaimed prophet whose schemes and manipulations drive the heart of Soyinka’s enduring satire.

Set against the vibrant atmosphere of Lagos and Bar Beach, the production, according to Rosalyn Aninyei, executive producer, ‘combines the humour and social commentary of the original play with live orchestral music, powerful vocals and African musical influences.’

‘The result is a fresh interpretation of one of Nigeria’s most recognised works of theatre, bringing Soyinka’s characters and themes to audiences through opera,’ Aninyei added.

The production is led by Rosalyn Aninyei as executive producer, with Gbolabo Gibbs Adebakin as director, Seun Owoaje as composer and Kehinde Oretimehin (Omo Kabiyesi) as librettist. The lead cast features Captain Gibbs, IGE, John Paul Ochei and Abiola Lepe.

The management of Ossiomo Power Company has again raised the alarm over the alleged continued vandalism of its facilities in Ologbo, Ikpoba-Okha Local Government Area of Edo State.

BusinessDay recalls that the company had on several occasions alleged the destruction of its facilities in the locality, with the management putting the value of the damaged and stolen equipment at several hundreds of millions of naira.

In a statement made available to newsmen in Benin City, the management accused youths in the community of being behind the alleged criminal acts.

The company alleged that some youths working for a certain Chinese company trespassed into the private premises of Ossiomo Power Company, where they vandalised and stole equipment from its 33kV electricity lines.

‘The electricity equipment either vandalised or stolen included expensive high-tension wires, cables and conductors worth several millions of naira,’ the company said.

The company alleged that Felix Okotie Otemowo, described as the leader of the gang, claimed when accosted by mobile policemen on guard duty at the power plant that he and his cohorts were acting at the behest of some highly placed individuals, including the Chinese firm and some community leaders.

‘We are also accusing the Edo State Government of giving backing to the Chinese firm and its alleged accomplices to destroy our facilities as well as to continue to occupy our premises,’ the statement alleged.

The statement, however, said the activities of the Chinese firm and the youth of the community were undermining and sabotaging President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration’s commitment to providing reliable electricity to Nigerians.

It explained that both the Federal High Court, Abuja, and the Edo State High Court, Benin City, had earlier restrained CCETC and those accused of carrying out the destruction on behalf of the Chinese firm from entering the premises of Ossiomo Power Company.

‘The criminal behaviours of the accused are clear breaches of the orders of both the Federal High Court, Abuja, and the Edo State High Court, Benin City.

‘It is also on record that suspects have on several occasions been invited by the police to answer for a number of criminal charges but they have refused to honour the police invitations,’ the management stated.

The company called on the authorities of the Nigeria Police Force to stop treating the alleged unlawful activities of the accused persons as if they were untouchable, alleging that the seeming inaction of the police had emboldened them to continue behaving like ‘sacred cows.’

It also called for the urgent intervention of Governor Monday Okpebholo to prevail on the community and the Chinese firm to stop the alleged vandalism of its property.

‘Ossiomo Power Company, which is legally established, should be left alone to reconnect its 33kV lines to enable it to resume the supply of electricity to millions of people in Edo State,’ the company said.

It would be recalled that Paul Usenbo, Edo State commissioner for Power, had in an interview with newsmen expressed concern over the inability of the Ossiomo power plant to provide electricity to millions of residents in the state.

‘Every megawatt that is unavailable has an economic consequence.The Government’s position is clear, we want the dispute resolved, the investment protected and electricity restored to consumers, but this must be achieved in accordance with the law.

‘The State Government will continue to facilitate structured negotiations between the parties, without taking sides in a private commercial dispute.

‘The security of critical electricity infrastructure must be guaranteed. No community, individual or private interest should be allowed to vandalise or unlawfully take control of power infrastructure,’ it stated.

Nigeria’s businesses have received a major signal from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), but the real test of its latest monetary policy decision will be whether the reduction in the benchmark interest rate translates into cheaper credit for businesses and increased financing for productive activity.

The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) on Tuesday, , reset the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) by 350 basis points from 26.5 percent to 23 percent, in what represents a significant recalibration after a prolonged period of tight monetary conditions.

The committee also recalibrated the Standing Facilities Corridor to +50/-300 basis points around the MPR, while retaining the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) at 45 percent for Deposit Money Banks, 16 percent for Merchant Banks and 75 percent for non-TSA public sector deposits.

While the size of the rate reduction is substantial, the CBN stressed that the decision should not be interpreted as a change in its underlying monetary policy stance. Instead, it described the move as an operational reset aimed at strengthening monetary policy transmission and restoring the MPR as the principal signal of monetary policy.

That distinction is central to understanding what the latest decision could mean for the economy.

The MPC said the divergence between the MPR and prevailing market rates had weakened the effectiveness of monetary policy transmission. The committee therefore considered the reset necessary to better align the monetary policy implementation framework with market realities.

The CBN’s ongoing repair of the monetary policy implementation framework, including the adoption of the Nigerian Overnight Financing Rate (NOFR) as a transaction-based operational benchmark, is expected to improve transparency in money-market operations and strengthen the transmission of monetary policy.

For businesses, however, the ultimate question is more straightforward: will the lower policy rate make borrowing cheaper?

The Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE) believes the decision creates an opportunity for this to happen, particularly after businesses have endured elevated financing costs that have constrained investment, production and working capital.

According to Muda Yusuf, chief executive officer of CPPE, the reduction should help lower the cost of capital, improve business cash flows, stimulate investment and strengthen productive capacity.

Manufacturing, agriculture, construction, logistics and other sectors with long investment cycles and tight margins stand to benefit if commercial lending rates respond to the new monetary policy environment.

But Yusuf cautioned that the economic value of the decision will depend heavily on transmission.

Banks, he said, need to reflect the new monetary policy environment in the pricing of credit, with lending rates on both new and existing facilities progressively adjusting downwards.

Without meaningful transmission to borrowers, the impact of the policy adjustment on investment and economic growth would be limited.

This is also the concern of the Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA), which welcomed the rate reduction but described it as a cautious development for businesses.

According to Adewale-Smatt Oyerinde, director-general of NECA, the reduction could support lower lending rates and improve access to working capital and investment financing, particularly for manufacturers and small and medium-sized businesses.

However, he noted that the speed and extent of the transmission would depend on how banks adjust their lending rates.

The retention of the 45 percent CRR for Deposit Money Banks also suggests that monetary conditions remain relatively tight despite the sharp reduction in the MPR.

This combination of a lower policy rate and unchanged reserve requirement is important because it shows that the CBN is attempting to improve monetary policy transmission while continuing to manage liquidity and inflation risks.

The revised corridor places the Standing Lending Facility at 23.5 percent and the Standing Deposit Facility at 20 percent. NECA said the adjustment could support improved liquidity management and monetary policy transmission.

The CBN’s decision comes against the backdrop of significant improvement in key macroeconomic indicators.

Headline inflation slowed to 15.39 percent in August 2026 from 15.43 percent in July, while food inflation declined to 19.57 percent from 20.31 percent.

Core inflation also moderated sharply to 13.29 percent from 14.97 percent, driven by lower costs of transport and healthcare services.

The 12-month moving average of headline inflation continued its decline to 16.30 percent in August from 16.89 percent in July, marking 20 consecutive months of moderation.

Month-on-month headline inflation also slowed to 0.71 percent from 1.57 percent, driven mainly by the moderation in food inflation.

For the MPC, the sustained moderation in inflation provides evidence that previous monetary tightening, exchange-rate stability and improved inflation expectations are helping to ease price pressures.

At the same time, economic growth has strengthened.

Real GDP grew by 4.43 percent in the second quarter of 2026, compared with 3.89 percent in the first quarter, reflecting improved performance in both the oil and non-oil sectors.

The non-oil sector expanded by 4.31 percent from 3.94 percent in the first quarter, supported by increased activities in information and communications technology, crop production, real estate, livestock, financial services and trade.

Oil-sector growth also accelerated to 7.31 percent from 2.57 percent.

The composite Purchasing Managers’ Index rose to 52.7 points in August from 51.1 points in July, suggesting continued expansion in economic activity.

The external sector has also strengthened, giving the CBN greater room to recalibrate monetary policy.

Gross external reserves stood at $55.25 billion on September 18, 2026, the highest level in 18 years and sufficient to finance approximately 11.3 months of imports of goods and services.

The balance of payments surplus improved to $3.51 billion in the second quarter from $2.38 billion in the first quarter, while the current-account surplus increased by 67.92 percent to $7.54 billion from $4.49 billion.

Uche Uwaleke, director of the Institute of Capital Market Studies and president of Capital Market Academics of Nigeria, said the 350-basis-point reduction was justified by moderating inflation, exchange-rate stability, improved FX-market liquidity and the accretion to external reserves.

He also linked the decision to the recently signed memorandum of understanding between the Minister of Finance and the CBN Governor on fiscal and monetary policy collaboration.

The improved macroeconomic conditions therefore provide the backdrop for the CBN’s attempt to move towards a more effective monetary policy framework.

But cheaper credit alone may not be enough to generate a sustained expansion in investment.

CPPE noted that a significant proportion of Nigeria’s inflationary pressures remains structural and supply-driven. Energy costs, logistics bottlenecks, insecurity, food-production constraints, infrastructure deficits and high regulatory costs continue to increase the cost of doing business.

This means that lower interest rates will need to be accompanied by supply-side reforms that reduce production costs, improve productivity, strengthen food and energy security and expand domestic productive capacity.

For businesses, the rate reduction could therefore provide relief on one important component of their operating costs, but it does not remove the broader constraints affecting production.

There are also risks to the new policy direction.

CPPE noted that the adjustment could affect interest-rate differentials and the relative attractiveness of naira-denominated financial assets, potentially creating risks of portfolio-flow reversals and renewed pressure on the foreign-exchange market.

However, Nigeria is approaching the policy transition with stronger external buffers, higher reserves and greater stability in the foreign-exchange market.

The CBN will therefore need to balance the opportunity created by lower rates with the need to protect the gains already made on inflation and exchange-rate stability.

The government could also benefit if the rate reduction translates into lower yields across the government securities market.

According to CPPE, the high-interest-rate environment has contributed significantly to the Federal Government’s domestic debt-service burden. A sustained moderation in interest rates could reduce the marginal cost of government borrowing and, over time, moderate domestic debt-service costs.

That could create additional fiscal space for infrastructure, security, education, healthcare and other development priorities.

Again, however, the fiscal benefit will depend on the extent to which the MPR adjustment translates into lower yields in the government securities market.

The banking industry itself enters this new phase with stronger capital buffers following the successful recapitalisation programme.

The MPC said the recapitalisation had strengthened banks’ resilience and capacity to finance long-term projects in critical sectors of the economy.

That creates an important opportunity for the latest monetary policy adjustment to move beyond financial-market indicators and affect the productive economy.

If banks respond to lower policy rates with more competitive lending rates, stronger capital positions could support greater financing for businesses and long-term projects.

But if lending rates remain high despite the MPR reduction, the transmission from monetary policy to the real economy could remain weak.

This makes the months ahead critical for businesses, banks, investors and policymakers.

The success of the September decision will not simply be measured by the movement of the MPR from 26.5 percent to 23 percent. It will be reflected in whether commercial lending rates decline, whether private-sector credit expands, whether investment responds, whether inflation continues to moderate and whether the foreign-exchange market remains stable.

The CBN has created more room for the cost of money to decline. CPPE and NECA, however, have highlighted the same fundamental challenge: the rate cut must reach the borrower.

For Nigeria’s businesses, that is where the real impact of the 350-basis-point reset will ultimately be determined.

The East-West Africa Amalgamation (EWAA), a regional organisation, which was inaugurated recently, has received a huge boost with a $10 billion investment fund.

The record investment in the future of the newly created regional organisation was made by the National Black Chamber of Commerce, USA. The historic gesture was recorded in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia at the inaugural of EWAA.

The new movement is designed to unlock Africa’s tourism, aviation, trade, commerce, and investment potential in propelling Africa’s economic development to a greater and sustainable height.

Tagged East-West Africa Amalgamation Through Tourism, Trade and Creative Arts, the new initiative is being curated and promoted by Motherland Beckons and IPADA Initiatives, both founded by Wanle Akinboboye, in partnership Accelerating Africa’s Growth Connect (AAGC), and Nigeria Association of Chambers of Commerce, Mines, Industry and Agriculture (NACCIMA).

Charles Debow, president, National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC), USA, announced the $10bn investment fund dedicated for the funding of businesses and trade on the continent at Ethiopia Skyline Hotel, Addis Ababa, amid appreciation by dignitaries from across the world.

According to Debow, the investment fund gesture was a move away from the tradition of talking and making unfulfilled promises to an era of practical and concrete action.

He assured on actualising the dream of EWAA through laid out action plans and transactions.

The investment fund, he disclosed, is to open investments and partnerships in the regions, and all over Africa and the Caribbean, for individuals, organisations and governments.

In addition to the investment fund, the National Black Chamber of Commerce through Debow, also announced opportunities of connecting individuals, organisations and governments in EWAA to 200 chambers of commerce networks spread across the United States of America and Canada.

The new wave of development aligned with the actualisation of the dream of Akinboboye, founder of Motherland Beckons and IPADA Initiatives, who through the years, have worked on his pet project of continent building through different activations.

One of them is the IPADA Initiatives, which two years ago inaugurated IPADA Celebrations, a mass movement of people and lovers of Africa from across the world to Africa to celebrate the beauty of the continent through tourism and investing in businesses to change the dynamics of the continent’s development paradigm.

Speaking at the event, Akinboboye, who doubles as the convener of EWAA, commended the president of NBCC and the organisation for the huge investment fund meant for projects in Africa and the Caribbean.

He called on individuals and organisations present at the event to make pitches for part of the investment fund for their projects, noting that it is going to be action immediately, and ‘no more talk.’

Some of the ongoing projects to be funded through the fund include those in Wolaita zone, and Wolyta Soddo, where La Campagne Tropicana Agro Ecotourism has taken off, with a huge investment in land areas and agreements already in place; La Campagne Agro-Eco Heritage Resorts and Farms in Taraba State, Nigeria and the Caribbean; and the about to take-off projects between La Campagne and the Ekiti State Government, Nigeria.

An indication that it was time for action as earlier canvassed by NBCC’s president and Akinboboye, were the pitches made on the spot by different individuals and organisations for a number of projects, with over 20 Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) signed.

As part of his individual support, Akinboboye made investments running into hundreds of dollars in different organisations at the event.

The United States (US) House of Representatives has received House Resolution 1546 to formally recognize October as Nigerian Heritage month across the US.

This major milestone for diaspora diplomacy and civic representation, was introduced by Representative Sanford D. Bishop, Jr. and championed by the Washington, D.C.-based Nigerian Center.

Nigerian Center, which advocated for the drive, is a national civic organization delivering legal services, financial empowerment platforms, and policy advocacy for African diaspora communities in the United States.

Representative Bishop underscored the community’s civic integration and economic influence during the introduction of the measure.

‘Nigerian Americans are among our most accomplished and highly educated citizens,’ Bishop stated. ‘They contribute so much to the rich fabric of our communities in Georgia and in many communities across the United States’.

‘I introduced House Resolution 1546 to recognize the generations of Nigerians who have immigrated to America’s shores and continue to make a difference in a wide range of fields such as medicine, engineering, technology, education, law, public service, entrepreneurship, sports, and the arts.’

The historic measure acknowledges the substantial economic, civic, and cultural contributions of Nigerian Americans while bolstering transatlantic ties between both nations.

To mark the legislative effort, the Nigerian Center will convene public officials, advocates, and community leaders for a formal press briefing in Washington on October 1, coinciding with Nigeria’s Independence Day.

US House Resolution 1546 highlights the measurable impact of the Nigerian-American demographic across vital sectors including healthcare, technology, higher education, financial services, public policy, and entrepreneurship.

Beyond domestic contributions, the resolution framing emphasizes the diaspora’s strategic role as an economic bridge fostering stronger bilateral trade, diplomacy, and enterprise exchange between the United States and Nigeria.

Echoing this stance, Representative Jonathan L. Jackson (IL-01), a key supporter of the initiative, noted that Nigerian heritage remains deeply intertwined with the broader American narrative.

‘October is an opportunity to recognize and celebrate the extraordinary contributions of Nigerian-Americans to the fabric of our nation,’ Jackson noted.

‘Nigerian-Americans have strengthened our communities through their leadership in business, medicine, education, science, the arts, faith, and public service. Their success reflects the enduring bonds between the United States and Nigeria and the power of the African diaspora to build bridges across nations and generations…. Nigerian heritage is American heritage, and we celebrate the people whose contributions make our nation stronger.’

Nkechi Ilechie, policy director at the Nigerian Center, described the congressional resolution as a pivotal validation of the community’s systemic role in American growth and institutional development.

‘This resolution is more than a recognition of our heritage; it is a recognition of the impact Nigerian Americans continue to make across the United States’.

‘….Nigerian Heritage Month gives our community an opportunity to celebrate our history while ensuring that our contributions are recognized as part of the broader American story,’, Ilechie said.

The October 1 briefing in Washington, D.C. will serve as the official launch pad for national commemorative events, establishing a recognized framework to showcase Nigerian-American achievement and deepen bilateral relations.

AG Mortgage Bank Plc grew its total assets by 48 percent to N33.04 billion in 2025 from N22.37 billion a year earlier, as the mortgage lender expanded its loan portfolio and strengthened its funding capacity.

Rev. Abel Amadi (PhD), chairman of the Board of Directors at AG Mortgage Bank, said the bank will continue to pursue growth while maintaining strong governance and risk management as it positions itself to benefit from Nigeria’s housing-finance needs.

‘The quality and sustainability of the Bank’s growth are as important as the growth itself,’ Amadi said in his address to shareholders at the bank’s 2026 annual general meeting.

According to the bank’s 2025 annual report, loans and advances rose 44 percent to N22.71 billion from N15.82 billion, while cash and cash equivalents surged 195 percent to N6.96 billion from N2.36 billion.

Customer deposits increased 14 percent to N9.48 billion from N8.31 billion, while shareholders’ funds rose 17 percent to N7.16 billion from N6.10 billion.

Total liabilities, however, increased 59 percent to N25.88 billion from N16.26 billion.

Amadi said the bank had continued to strengthen and diversify its funding sources during the year, highlighting the importance of appropriately structured, long-term funding to mortgage banking.

‘The Board remains committed to strengthening AG Mortgage Bank as an institution capable of delivering sustainable value to shareholders while fulfilling its important role in expanding access to housing finance in Nigeria,’ he said.

The chairman explained that the bank’s growth strategy was increasingly focused on building ‘a larger, stronger, technology-driven and customer-centric institution’ capable of serving Nigeria’s housing-finance opportunity effectively and sustainably.

The balance-sheet expansion came alongside stronger earnings, with gross earnings rising 42 percent to N4.93 billion in 2025 from N3.47 billion.

Profit Before Tax (PBT) increased 89 percent to N1.38 billion, while profit after tax rose 130 percent to N1.06 billion from N458.7 million.

Ngozi Anyogu, managing director/CEO of AG Mortgage Bank, attributed the performance to improved business volumes, stronger income generation and continued attention to the quality of earnings, despite elevated funding costs, inflation and reduced household purchasing power.

‘Despite the operating challenges, the bank delivered a significantly improved financial performance,’ Anyogu said.

He emphasised that the bank’s response to the challenging environment was to focus on ‘disciplined growth, strengthening our balance sheet, expanding funding capacity and improving the Bank’s ability to serve its customers.’

‘In marking the bank’s 21st anniversary, we released the revamped website which is poised to scale the operations of AG Mortgage Bank,’ he added.

Anyogu said the growth in the loan portfolio demonstrated the bank’s increasing capacity to deploy funding into mortgage and other appropriate lending opportunities while maintaining credit discipline and portfolio quality.

Looking ahead, the bank is committed to deepening its core mortgage business, expand housing-finance opportunities, diversify its funding base, improve customer experience and use technology and strategic partnerships to extend its reach.

Nentawe Yilwatda, National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has affirmed that there is no threat posed by opposition parties ahead of the 2027 general elections, describing the opposition as ‘ mere cut and join parties’ who only exist on social media.

Speaking to journalists at the end of a three-day retreat in Maiduguri, Yilwatda said parties like the African Democratic Congress (ADC), the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) and others pose no serious threat to the ruling party because the opposition is only participating, not contesting.

The event brought together members of the National Working Committee (NWC), elected members of the National Executive Committee (NEC), and state chairmen of the ruling party.

According to the APC chairman, the party’s electoral prospects remain formidable, citing recent outcomes from five by-elections held nationwide.

He taunted, ‘I think when we are talking about elections and those who are ready, we should not talk about this ‘cut and join’ opposition that can’t win a councilorship in the election.

He further said the ruling party secured victory in four of the contests, losing only one to the APM-not to the major opposition parties often touted in the media.

‘I believe they only exist on social media, not visible in major contests. We went to Ekiti and came first; the party that came second was the PDP, not the so-called opposition (ADC and NDC). We went to Osu and came second; none of those political parties you claimed won even a council seat

‘So if they can’t even win a councillorship, are we contesting against them? They are participants in this election, not contesting with us. We are very confident that our party can win this election; we are prepared to win the 2027 election.’

Yilwatda highlighted further electoral data from polls in Osun and legislative contests in the North and South-East, including Enugu, Kano, Bauchi, and Gombe, where the APC recorded strong showings.

He argued that media narratives regarding opposition momentum do not align with realities on the ground.

‘Even last week, we had a by-election in Adamawa, in Ganye local government, where Atiku comes from, and we won the election. We are very grounded, and I doubt if any party can challenge us because people know better now,’ He argued.

Retreat Resolutions and Votes of Confidence

Detailing the resolutions reached during the three-day retreat, Yilwatda announced that the party leadership observed a moment of mourning, extending condolences to the government and people of Niger State over the tragic loss of 37 miners.

He also noted that the NWC conducted a comprehensive review of the party’s structures from the national level down to the polling units, giving the APC a ‘clean bill of health’ as a strong, healthy, and well-oiled machine heading into 2027.

Crucially, the gathering passed a vote of confidence in President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima, and all party candidates emerging from primary elections.

‘We strongly believe that we produce some of the most credible candidates, most acceptable, and most prepared to serve the people of Nigeria,’ He stressed.

The party also resolved to intensify grassroots reconciliation efforts, urging state chapters to establish committees to consolidate unity and preserve past electoral gains.

The NWC pledged to lead campaigns from the front, highlighting the administration’s achievements.

Pointing to recent electoral breakthroughs in areas traditionally considered opposition strongholds-such as winning senatorial seats in states where the party previously struggled-Yilwatda expressed optimism about the APC’s widening national appeal.

The APC Chairman expressed gratitude to Nigerians for their support over the past three years. He called on citizens and party faithful to turn out en masse to re-elect President Tinubu and other APC candidates in 2027.

The road needed no advocate. It would cut freight transit time between an inland agricultural belt and the nearest port from four days to under one, in a corridor already carrying enough traffic to justify the investment on paper several times over. Government backed it. Local farmers’ associations had lobbied for it for a decade. An engineering feasibility study confirmed the alignment was sound. A well-regarded regional development bank had flagged it as a priority corridor. By any economic measure, the project should have existed already. Three years after the first term sheet was drafted, it still did not exist, and it was not the traffic projections, the government’s commitment, or investor appetite for transport infrastructure that had stalled it. It was that no one had ever actually finished building the project, as opposed to the road.

The financial model had changed hands twice and reflected assumptions no one could fully defend. The land along a third of the alignment had never been formally acquired, and the resettlement framework existed as a draft. The concession agreement allocated construction risk in a way no contractor would accept without repricing. Environmental approvals covered the original alignment, not the one that had since been revised for cost reasons. None of this made the road a bad idea. It made it, in the language investment committees actually use, not yet a project at all, merely a very good idea that had been mistaken for one.

The fiction of the bankable project

Infrastructure finance talks constantly about ‘bankable projects’ and ‘unbankable projects,’ as though bankability were a trait a project either possesses at birth or lacks, like a genetic condition diagnosed once and true forever. This language does real damage, because it locates the problem in the project’s essential nature rather than in the work that has or has not been done to it. A project is not bankable or unbankable. It is prepared or unprepared, and preparation is not a formality that follows a good idea. It is the substantial, expensive, technically demanding work that turns a good idea into something a fiduciary can actually approve.

This distinction matters because it changes where responsibility and investment should sit. If bankability were an inherent quality, the rational response to an infrastructure gap would be to search harder for projects that already have it, or wait for markets to produce more of them. If bankability is instead a constructed outcome, the rational response is to build the capacity that constructs it, deliberately, as infrastructure in its own right. The evidence overwhelmingly supports the second view. The road above was not short of demand, or government support, or an interested market. It was short of the unglamorous sequence of technical, legal and institutional work that converts an idea into a transaction, and no one had been paying for that sequence to be completed.

Five things that are not the same

The distance between an infrastructure need and an infrastructure asset in operation runs through at least five distinct stages, and conflating them is where much of the gap originates. A good idea is a project that makes economic and developmental sense; the road cutting transit time is a good idea in the most straightforward possible way. A good project adds a credible technical design and an initial cost estimate, still well short of what any financier requires. A bankable project has completed the harder work, feasibility studies robust enough to withstand institutional diligence, land secured, permits obtained, offtake or demand risk addressed, a legal and commercial structure that allocates risk in terms a lender will accept. A financeable transaction has gone further still, structured the actual capital stack, negotiated terms with specific lenders and investors, and resolved the documentation those parties require to commit. And an investable asset is what exists after financial close, generating the risk-adjusted return the capital structure was built around.

Each transition between these stages requires different capability, different capital, and different institutional actors, and the world’s infrastructure-finance conversation routinely collapses all five into a single word: bankable. Governments announce good ideas and call them pipelines. Development institutions catalogue good projects and call them investment opportunities. Investors are then asked to evaluate what is, in reality, still several stages of expensive, specialised work away from being a transaction they can finance, and when they decline, the conclusion drawn is that capital is scarce or risk-averse, rather than that the project was presented several stages too early.

The preparation gap, and why the market does not close it on its own

The reason this gap persists is structural, not accidental. Project preparation, the feasibility studies, legal structuring, environmental and social work, land acquisition, transaction advisory, is expensive, can run into the tens of millions of dollars for a major infrastructure asset, and carries a high probability of failure: a meaningful share of projects that enter preparation will not survive it, for good reasons discovered during the process itself. Commercial capital is structurally reluctant to fund this stage, not because commercial investors are short-sighted, but because the economics do not work for them. A commercial lender earns a return on capital deployed into a financed asset; it has no natural mechanism to earn a return on capital spent developing a project that may never reach financial close. Asking commercial capital to fund preparation is asking it to underwrite outcomes it cannot price.

This is precisely the kind of risk that development finance exists to absorb, and to its credit, much of the development finance system understands this in principle. In practice, funding for project preparation is frequently fragmented across donor grants, government budgets, and ad hoc technical assistance facilities that are too small, too short-lived, or too narrowly scoped to build a genuine pipeline. A preparation grant that expires before a project reaches financial close does not produce a bankable project; it produces a partially prepared one, competing for a second round of funding against a new cohort of equally partial projects. Fragmentation, more than underfunding in the aggregate, is what makes the preparation gap so persistent: the resources exist across the system, but rarely in a single, sufficiently capitalised, sufficiently patient instrument capable of carrying a project the full distance from concept to close.

What actually closes the gap

The instruments that work share a common design principle: they treat preparation as an investment with its own capital structure, not a grant to be dispensed and forgotten. Dedicated project-development facilities, capitalised patiently enough to fund a project through the full preparation sequence and structured to recover their costs, often through a development fee at financial close, from the projects that succeed, create the right incentive: the facility is paid for building bankable projects, not merely for spending a preparation budget. Revolving preparation facilities extend this further, recycling recovered development costs from successful projects back into preparing the next cohort, building institutional memory and technical capability that a one-off grant never accumulates. Transaction advisers, engaged early rather than brought in once a deal is already troubled, bring the specific skill of structuring a project simultaneously for developmental and commercial acceptability, the skill most conspicuously absent from the road project above. Standardised preparation frameworks and documentation, built once and reused across many projects in a sector, cut the cost and time of preparing each subsequent one. And project aggregation, bundling smaller assets that could not individually justify full transaction costs into a single prepared pipeline, makes preparation economical at a scale that matters.

Development finance institutions have a specific and underused role here: not simply as lenders of last resort once a project is already prepared, but as the patient capital willing to fund preparation itself, on the understanding that a meaningful share of what they fund will not survive to financial close, and that this attrition is the cost of producing the projects that do. Institutions that have internalised this, building dedicated project-development arms rather than treating preparation as an occasional grant line item, consistently produce deeper, more reliable pipelines than those that wait for bankable projects to appear and then compete to finance them.

Bankability is built

The central insight this article insists on is a simple correction to how the industry talks: the world does not have a shortage of bankable projects waiting to be financed so much as it habitually tries to finance projects before it has finished building them. Bankability is not discovered in due diligence. It is constructed, deliberately, through a sequence of technical, legal and institutional work that costs real money, takes real time, and requires real capability, and every stage skipped or rushed reappears later as a reason financing fails to close.

This connects directly to the first two articles in this series. Article 1 established that capital availability does not guarantee deployment, that the constraint is a shortage of investable projects rather than investable funds. Article 2 established that even a well-conceived project stalls when risk sits unallocated rather than translated into something a financier can hold. Bankability is where these two threads meet: it is the state a project reaches once its risks have been properly allocated and its preparation has been properly financed, the point at which capital that was always available and risk that has been properly translated finally have something ready to receive them.

Even a fully bankable project, however, still faces one more decision before capital arrives: not whether it deserves financing, but what kind of capital should provide it, at what cost, in what proportion of debt to equity, concessional to commercial, and on what terms. A perfectly prepared, perfectly de-risked project can still fail to close if it is offered the wrong capital structure, priced for the wrong risk profile, or sized against the wrong balance sheet. That is the question this series turns to next.

That is the Missing Middle of Financial Structure.

. Nwafor is founder and lead strategist at De-Lazuli Consult, an advisory practice focused on energy transition, project finance, DFI engagement and infrastructure investment facilitation. He writes from Lagos and Abuja. chidi.nwafor@de-lazuliconsult.com

In his opening speech, His Royal Majesty, Igwe Nnaemeka Alfred Achebe, Obi of Onitsha, who was chairman of the occasion, said: ‘I have watched Nigeria’s journey from the optimism of independence, through the turbulence of military rule, into the fragile and still-unfinished project of democratic self-governance. It is in that spirit of witness, and of shared responsibility, that I speak to you today.

‘You have chosen a theme of unusual gravity: ‘The Ballot, the Media and the Task of Keeping Democracy Alive.’ I want to dwell, for a moment, on that phrase – ‘keeping democracy alive.’ It presupposes something many of us take for granted. Some of us may think that democracy, once established, sustains itself. We think that it does not.’

The monarch noted that ‘Democracy is not a monument we erect and then walk away from. It is more like a fire lit to keep the house warm. It must be tended, fed, protected from wind and rain, or it dies quietly in the night while everyone believes it still burns.

‘In our Igbo tradition, the Obi does not rule by decree. He rules in council, in dialogue, in the constant testing of truth against the wisdom of elders and the voice of the people. Igbo democratic instinct is ancient. Even kingship here has always been checked by community, by consultation, by honest speech.’

According to him, ‘The ballot box, in this sense, is not an import grafted onto our soil. It is a modern vessel for an old African value, which states that legitimate power flows from the consent, the voice, and the informed judgment of the people. But consent is only be meaningful if it is informed. And this is where you, the editors of this nation, become not merely chroniclers of democracy but its guardians also.

‘The ballot is the citizen’s voice. The media is the mirror by which that citizen sees the world clearly enough to know what to say with that voice. When the mirror is cracked, or worse, deliberately distorted, the citizen no longer votes from truth but votes from illusion. And a democracy built on illusion is not genuine democracy but drama. It becomes a theatre.

‘This brings me to your sub-theme, which I confess unsettles me more than any topic I have addressed in recent years: ‘When Lies Look Real: Detecting and Debunking AI Disinformation Before, During and After Elections.’

‘We are living through a transformation as profound as the invention of the printing press, and perhaps more dangerous. For centuries, falsehood required a human liar, someone who had to look you in the eye, construct a story, and hope you believed it.

‘Today, falsehood can be manufactured by machines in seconds, with a persuasiveness that mimics truth so precisely that even trained eyes struggle to tell the difference. A voice that sounds exactly like a governor can now say something that the governor never said. A video can show a candidate in a place he never was; an image can depict violence that never occurred, timed precisely to inflame passions on the eve of an election.

‘This is no longer a hypothetical danger for some distant future. It is here, now, in our elections, in our WhatsApp groups, on our social timelines. And it is uniquely suited for our children because it exploit the very things that make our democracy vibrant, such as our diversity, our passionate political engagement, our deep trust in community and kinship networks as sources of information.

‘The same social fabric that has made resilience can now become the very medium through which falsehood spreads fastest, precisely because we trust the neighbour, the town union, the family WhatsApp group, more than we trust a stranger.

‘Therefore, to consider three responsibilities that fall upon you with particular weight in this era.’

The Obi stated that ‘The first is the responsibility of verification before speed. In the old order, being first with the news was honour. In this new order, being first with a lie dressed as news is a betrayal of the public trust, however unintentional. You must become, individually and institutionally, sceptical of anything too perfectly damning, too conveniently timed to be shared before it is checked. The discipline of pausing, of asking ‘how do I know this is true?’ must become as instinctive to rush to publish once was.

‘The second is the responsibility of literacy. You must understand the tools of disinformation well enough to detect their fingerprints. This includes the subtle unnaturalness in a synthetic voice, the inconsistent shadows in a fabricated image, and the coordinated pattern of accounts that spread a falsehood in unison. But detection alone is not enough. You must also become teachers, helping ordinary citizens, from the market woman in Onitsha to the undergraduate in Nsukka, to develop their own instincts for scepticism, without curdling that scepticism into a cynicism that trusts nothing at all. We must note that a citizenry that believes everything is as dangerous as one that believes nothing.

‘The third is the responsibility of courage. Debunking a lie that flatters your own political camp is far harder than debunking one that flatters your rival. True journalistic integrity in this era will require you to correct falsehoods regardless of who benefits from them, before, during, and yes, after elections, when the temptation to let a convenient narrative stand unchallenged is often strongest.’