Gapbridge Microfinance Bank bags award for women empowerment in Lagos
August 13, 2008 by ella
In recognition of its contribution and support towards the empowerment of women, especially at the grassroots level, Gapbridge Microfinance Bank recently bagged an award. This award was received at the vocational training graduation ceremony organised for members of Iyan Group, an affiliate of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation Ministry (WAPA), Lagos State.
According to a statement issued by the bank, the award came in recognition of the bank’s efforts towards the empowerment of the people at the grassroots, which constitute majority of its target audience.
Since its inception of business, the bank has been at the vanguard of social finance with a bias for grassroots women empowerment and development and as such has won their admiration. The bank has partnered with quite a number of NGO’s focused on poverty alleviation programmes for women for no other reason than the fact that the world over, women constitute majority of the poor and they engage in lots of petty trading, which they use in enhancing the well-being of their families.
Iyan Group, a grassroots women group and one of the partners of Gapbridge Microfinance Bank, commenced a training programme for its members due to the huge skill gap that was noticed within the group. The training programme, which covered vocations like soap and detergent production, bead making, tailoring, hair dressing etc was put in place to help its members earn sustainable living for themselves.
The founder of the group, Chief Mrs. Modupe Awodogan, (a.k.a) Iya Oniyan stated that rather than just provide skill acquisition training for members of the group, they decided to partner with Gapbridge Microfinance Bank to enable the group access to soft loans as start-up capital for exceptional candidates on conclusion of the training programme. The partnership scheme kicked off with N1 million loan provision for 20 exceptional candidates out of the 50 that partook in the programme. The sum of N50,000 each was given to each of the 20 candidates to be paid back in six months at five per cent interest rate.
Speaking at the event, Mr. Yemi Euba, Group Head, Marketing, Gapbridge Microfinance Bank stated that the partnership was made achievable via one of the bank’s product, Gapbridge Group Guaranty Scheme, whereby members of the group save consistently towards the ultimate aim of receiving loan as at when due in a rotary system.
Euba said the scheme has made loan acquisition easy for registered groups with the bank and has further helped to de-emphasise the demand for collateral and has helped to reduce repayment default.
Mrs. Folashade Jaji, Permanent Secretary, Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation Ministry, Lagos State, while delivering a goodwill message on behalf of the Deputy Governor of Lagos State, Mrs. Sarah Sosan, encouraged the women to strive to be the best that they can be, adding that Lagos State is committed to enhancing the status of women in the state. She also hinted that Gapbridge Microfinance Bank is one of the banks selected to partner with Lagos State in the Eko Microfinance Scheme and therefore urged them to co-operate with the bank so that they can also benefit from the Eko Microfinance Scheme.
“When a fraction of a group registered with the bank are given loan opportunities, the leadership of the group and other members of the group will encourage their colleagues to payback when due so that some other members can also be availed loan opportunity to improve their businesses. This further encouraged the first set of beneficiaries from Iyan Group to put the skills they acquired to practice, be diligent in their businesses and be aggressive in making sales to ease payback of the loan,” he stated.
