By Babajide Komolafe

Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mallam Lamido Sanusi, has mandated the apex bank to produce measurable targets on the progress of the Financial System Strategy, FSS, 2020.

He gave this mandate during the signing of Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with the German Development Agency for cooperation and partnership on FSS 2020. The strategy is aimed at making Nigeria the financial hub of Africa by year 2020.

Sanusi said the essence of the cooperation was to ensure that financial institutions do not constitute instability in the system. He noted that the occasion presents greater opportunities for much work to be done and advised that the cooperation should clearly spell out deliverables, measurement targets and actual matrix on progress.

Earlier, the German team led by the Country Director, Karl Bruening, highlighted such areas of cooperation to include microfinance, laws and regulations as part of banking sector reforms.

Already, a consultant, Mr. Robin Hofmeister, has been deployed to the Project Management Office, PMO, to provide necessary support to FSS 2020 programmes.

In the cooperation agreement, Bruening’s team will assist in developing a tool kit for financial sector reforms using the FSS 2020 model as well as providing technical assistance and guidance to the FSS 2020 Secretariat.

Other areas of cooperation include the Access to Insurance Initiatives, AZII, which involves a comprehensive diagnostic study of Nigeria’s insurance sector and conducting a capacity due-diligence exercise on key regulatory agencies.

It will examine issues of overall insurance product range, institutions, micro-insurance, re-insurance and so on.