Founder and the immediate past Managing Director of Nigeria seemly largest and major micro finance bank by physical present, the Lift Above Poverty Organisation, LaPO Micro Finance Bank, Godwin Ehigiamusoe has returned to the bank as the Chairman, Board of Directors, the apex decision making body of the bank, apparently to provide founder’s visionary leadership in the new evolving online market, and probably contained the problem of high and exorbitant interest rates on loans currently charged by other micro finance banks who have a larger present in the online banking platform, likely the same way he came into the banking sector in 1987 and eased out the difficulties of low income earners accessing loan in the country, due to the demands of high valuable collaterals as basic requirement for loan administration in Nigeria by the then existing banks, which also slowed down Nigeria development especially among the economic active rural and semi urban dwellers.
Although, LaPO MFB Online platform currently has a little bit more than 50 thousand users on Google Play Store, but the bank has been consistent with interest rate of 3.5, 3 percent flat rate per month or less on his various loan products for more than eight years despite new government policies and economic challenges that have forced many banks including Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN to scale up lending rate in numbers of occasions since 2017.
While as the Managing Director of the bank, Godwin Ehigiamusoe sought the board approval and changed the interest rate from 2.2 percent flat rate per month to 5 percent reducing balance per month in response to the economic policies of the then President Muhammadu Buhari and later reversed the interest rates on loans to between 2.5 and 3 percent flat rate per month, apparently when he saw that the reducing balance interest on loan capitalization method was not favourable to larger Nigeria banking customers.
LaPO MFB has remained one of the banks in Nigeria that charged the lowest interest rates on loans even after Godwin Ehigiamusoe left office as the bank Managing Director in 2019.
Other Micro Finance Banks like Kuda, FairMoney Online Platforms have more than 10 million users each on Google Play Store but the Nigeria Business Communities are currently facing untold hardship of high and exorbitant interest rates on loans that ranges between 9 to 18 percent reducing balance per month in the online market.
LaPO Microfinance Bank in a statement on Monday said Dr Godwin Ehigiamusoe has been appointed as the new the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the bank.
Ehigiamusoe succeeds Osaretin Demuren, who the bank said in a statement made available to media on Monday that she provided excellent leadership for the institution particularly in consolidating the microfinance bank’s leadership position in the sub-financial sector.
Adding that Godwin Ehigiamusoe brings into the position his rich experience and institutional memory that will be of immense benefits to LaPO Microfinance Bank and national financial inclusion efforts.
Dr Ehigiamusoe is an acknowledged microfinance practitioner who, for over three decades, pioneered several initiatives that have contributed to the expansion of the frontiers of finance in Nigeria and beyond.
In the late 1980’s, he initiated Lift Above Poverty Organization (LaPO) as a non-governmental response to the spike in poverty as a result of the implementation of the Structural Adjustment Programme-SAP.
LaPO has evolved into a number of mutually reinforcing institutions in microfinance, healthcare; insurance, micro-leasing; technology and agriculture.
He earned a doctorate degree in policy and development studies with emphasis on policy instruments and financial inclusion.
He is a chartered microfinance banker, and Fellow, Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria.
Dr Ehigiamusoe sees his appointment as an opportunity to build on the achievements of LaPO Microfinance Bank and contribute to deepening financial inclusion, according to the bank statement.