EXCLUSIVE: How bank verification numbers and other details of farmers seeking loans under the Central Bank scheme were used to steal several million naira from Nigerian government coffers
A monumental multi-billion naira fraud has been uncovered under the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Anchor Borrowers scheme.
Some anonymous program officials, in collusion with their cronies in co-operative societies and commercial banks around the country, have worked closely to use bank verification numbers and other vital details of loan seekers to defraud both the government and farmers, SaharaReporters learned. .
An investigation by SaharaReporters into this gratuitous plunder of public funds revealed how some wheat farmers in Bauchi State under Evergreen Cooperative Society in 2017 applied for the CBN loan through Madaki Agro Alliance but never received a dime despite their information used to open bank accounts and huge sums. put back into them.
More than 40 Evergreen Cooperative Society farmers were invited to submit their BVN and other vital details to a branch of Stanbic IBTC Bank in Bauchi for the opening of an account where the requested loans will be disbursed after approval by the government via the CBN.
Farmers were looking to grow wheat in commercial quantities on 10 hectares of land per person to further boost Nigeria’s drive for food self-sufficiency.
While awaiting the next stage of the loan collection process after fulfilling all the necessary conditions, the applicants were shocked to receive notification in December 2017 of the opening of accounts in their name at Sterling Bank.
Initially dismissing the development as the work of scammers trying to trick them into falling into the trap of their latest scheme, the contestants were quickly astonished when a total of 1.3 million naira was paid into each of the accounts opened and that transactions began to take place on them.
After approaching Sterling Bank to complain about the development, bank officials told them to contact Madaki Agro Alliance for further clarification.
Realizing that the money had been withdrawn from their accounts in quick succession, the claimants contacted Madaki Agro Alliance for an explanation of the whole issue and it was then that it became clearer that they had simply been used to steal huge funds under the CBN Anchor Borrowers. ‘ Program.
“Immediately we approached Madaki Agro Alliance as requested by some Sterling Bank officials to complain about the use of our details to open bank accounts and funds being paid in and out without our knowledge, we realized that we had been used as pawns to siphon off billions of naira from government coffers.
“We were offered 10% of the original N1.3m loan amount as a ‘gift’ in return for keeping quiet about the blatant act of fraud, impersonation and forgery committed against us.
“We rejected the deal and wondered why our BVN and vital details were used to open accounts at Sterling Bank instead of Stanbic where we registered for the same purpose. Those handling the loan told us to forget about the matter as it had already been settled.
“We reported the issue to the Consumer Protection Agency, Department of State Services in 2018, but nothing came of the issue.
“How can our details be used to open accounts in a bank and billions of naira of transactions carried out on them and no one will be willing to offer an explanation.
“The managers of the CBN anchor borrower program simply used us to steal money from the government; we never received a penny for the loan we requested. I never believed that a fraud of this magnitude can be committed and nothing will be done,” revealed a concerned claimant, Muhammad Sani Abdullahi.
According to SaharaReporters findings, between 2017 and 2018, farmers’ information from at least 46 other cooperative organizations was used to open bank accounts through which billions of naira of government money was siphoned off under the scheme. CBN Anchor Borrowers.
“This is only a small fraction of the fraud that takes place within the program. It happens with the active connivance and participation of those responsible for making the program successful,” said another concerned candidate. , Adamu Madaki.
The CBN Anchor Borrowers scheme is an agricultural loan scheme launched in 2015 by the Nigerian government through the apex bank to increase agricultural yields, stop large volumes of food imports and address the negative trade balance.
In February 2022, the CBN revealed that 948 billion naira had so far been given to farmers across the country under the scheme.
“Specifically, through the Anchor Borrowers program, we have disbursed N948 billion to 4,478,381 smallholder farmers who have cultivated 5.2 million hectares of farmland across the country, creating 12.5 million direct and indirect jobs,” CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele said at the time.
But much of this amount that would have been disbursed by the apex bank and its agents ended up in the pockets of corrupt officials, denying farmers, who need the loans, the chance to do so.
In April 2021, the CBN stopped payouts to the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending following massive allegations of fraud.
In January 2017, farmers in Cross River State under the scheme alleged that they had received 95,000 Naira each for a fertilizer loan while being forced to sign that they had received 250,000 Naira.
Despite these and other revelations, the scheme’s managers continued to devise various ways to steal public funds on a massive scale.
Contacted by SaharaReporters about the matter, CBN spokesperson Osita Nwanisobi did not return calls.
He had also not yet responded to a text message sent to him at the time of this report.
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