President of The National Association of Nigerian Traders (NANTS), Ken Ukaoha has said the association is ready to access the N140 billion Federal Government Enterprise Empowerment Programme (GEEP) fund, initiated by the Buhari administration for traders, artisans, market men and women.
Ken, who said the association has chosen Access Bank and Fidelity Bank for the programme explained that “The Federal Government rolled out a facility meant for traders, artisans and market men and women, and it is called the GEEP under the Systematic Investment Plan (SIP).
“It is being implemented by Bank of Industry (BOI).
“N140 billion was projected by the Federal Government for this and it is on-going in many of the states.
“One of the things that we have done is to screen the potential beneficiaries and we had to engage with some banks to train potential beneficiaries essentially those who are our market coordinators so that they do not see it as a national cake.
“We want to train these people, build their capacity on how to utilise these fund effectively, how to ensure they have records, booking keeping and financial management and also how they can be able to do a financial evaluation every month.’’
