Who Are Beneficiaries of DBN’s N1tn Empowerment?

The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 elections, Peter Obi, last week questioned the Development Bank of Nigeria’s (DBN) claim that it has disbursed more than N1 trillion to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

The former Anambra State governor, who raised the concern in a post on his X handle, said by simple conversion over the said period, this amounts to more than $1billion.

DBN had said it disbursed over N1trillion in “empowerment interventions” since 2015, with 62 per cent benefiting women. The Managing Director of DBN, Tony Okpanachi, said the initiative aims to improve women’s access to finance for MSMEs.

But Obi claimed that findings from his interactions showed that most business owners had no knowledge of the bank’s existence. He noted that if the bank had indeed released over $1 billion into the MSME space in the form of small loans averaging $1,000, at least 1 million small businesses would have benefited.

If indeed such an amount had been deployed to support enterprises, the results should be evident. For instance, if $1billion was disbursed in small loans averaging about $1,000 each, it could have supported at least one million small businesses.

The ripple effect of this would have been no less than three million new jobs, with visible growth in enterprises, an improved economy, and measurable progress in lifting people out of poverty.

DBN needs to come clean. bank needs to disclose details of the alleged disbursement, including the list of beneficiaries, the enterprises supported, and the jobs created. Empowerment should not be reduced to slogans or political promises but must be demonstrated through measurable outcomes.

The reality before Nigerians today tells a different story: unemployment remains at a record high, businesses are struggling to survive rather than thriving, many enterprises are shutting down or relocating outside Nigeria, and poverty is deepening rather than abating. So the critical question is: if ₦1 trillion truly left the coffers of DBN to empower Nigerians, where did the money go?