The Lion King | 15
Growing the Seed
intends to be an unbeatable player is
the financing of infrastructural projects,
and equally energy. It is worth recall-
ing that we were the only bank that
supported the Government of the
Republic Benin for the construction of a
facility to protect the East Coast of the
country against ocean surge through
a XOF 5.2 billion SBLC in favour of the
contractor Royal Boskalis.
UBA Benin is the collecting bank for
the national power holding company
after the significant funding we granted
them in 2010, which helped revolution-
ize the company. Power is a crucial
area of interest for us, and we already
have few IPP project in our view.
Also, we are very active in the telecoms
sector and we participated in the syndi-
cated loan of MTN Benin to acquire
a 3G license. We are discussing with
Government and other GSM operators
on various projects in the pipeline.
Finally, UBA Benin, through its Africash
product has made a big contribution to
the economy by assisting to attract and
capture the informal trade businesses
into the formal banking sector.
The average daily volume on Africash
is about 500 transactions and EUR
4 million captured by UBA from the
informal market. So, we have proudly
created another avenue for tax income
generation for the Benin Government.
This has even been recognized and
saluted by the regulatory authorities.
Do you face the dilemma between
investing government bonds and treas-
ury bills, as against outright lending?
How do you manage this?
Considering the realities on ground and
the challenges of the local banking
industry highlighted above, there is
urgent need for us to change our
investment paradigm as far as our risk
asset mix is concerned.
About 8 months ago, we took a delib-
erate choice to slow down on lending,
while targeting a few select sectors
within the economy to play in. It is
necessary that we must invest in T-bills
and government bonds to compensate
for the income leakage resulting from
the reduction in our direct lending.
We are conscious of the country risk
of our exposure to government securi-
ties. However, the Republic of Benin is
quite a peaceful country with very low
political risk profile and the Government
has so far met its financial obligations as
far as government bonds and T-bills are
concerned.
However, we are also emphasizing
the development of other fee based
products. Africash, for example, is a
good product on a global level and
we need the Group’s support so that
it is profitable to the subsidiary on a
standalone basis. FX transaction is also
a key area to leverage on, in attain-
ment of our targets.
In terms of performance where do
you think UBA Benin will be in next five
years?
Going by our strategic intent, UBA Benin
will comfortably rank amongst the top
3 banks in the next 3 years and the
second biggest Bank in Benin in 5 years.
But our target is number 1. However, to
achieve this upward movement, our
current total deposit base must quadru-
ple within three to five years period.
We are putting in place additional
quality human capital and resources
to achieve this. With the backing of the
UBA Group, we will surely accomplish
our strategic intent.
