By Favour Nnabugwu

Contributions into the National Housing Fund (NHF) scheme rose to N22 billion in 2012 from N17 billion in 2011, accounting for about 40 per cent of total collections since inception about 21 years ago.

Chairman, Board of Directors of the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, (FMBN), Chief Bisi Ogunjobi, disclosed this in Abuja, last week, at a workshop organised by the bank to enlighten the general public and stakeholders on the role, rules and operations of the NHF scheme in providing affordable housing to the people. He noted that the scheme has made tremendous progress in the last two years, but lamented that despite the gains, the scheme is yet to fully achieve its set target as a window of housing provision in Nigeria.

Some of the limiting factors, according to him, are failure of some states and organisations to be contributors to the scheme, lack of finance from the banks and insurance companies and poor management of the funds. “With the establishment of the NHF  21 years ago, like a child it should have become an adult having reached the age of puberty and be eligible to vote and be voted for and ready to take on responsibility for building his or her own family. Unfortunately, the high hopes enshrined in the NHF Act have not all been realised.

For example, while NHF is a mandatory contributory scheme for all Nigerian workers, to date not all States and organizations are contributors while the investments expected from the banks and insurance companies are none existent. At the same time, the management and performance of the Fund have been less than optimal,” he stated.

The FMBN chairman stressed that amidst these entrenched constraints, the focus of the bank is to increase the NHF base, coverage, collection, remittance and achieve overall efficiency and persuade the non-compliant states and organisations to join the scheme.

On the whole, he identified lack of access to funding, difficulties with property registration; titling; cost and time of foreclosing; high interest rate; and lack of housing supply – new construction, as the major challenges confronting the housing sector.

He however, noted that as part of the bank’s moves to broaden the bank’s clientele base and create product varieties, moves are on to introduce new products such as the Rent-to-Own Housing Model and a Housing Scheme for Nigerians in Diaspora.