As they count their losses, large scale rice farmers in the country have appealed to the Presidency to wade into the controversy surrounding the N1 trillion Anchor Borrowers’ Loans they allegedly defaulted in repaying.
Their appeal came against the presidential directive to security agencies to recover the huge loans from the beneficiaries.
The rice farmers, who had been accused of loan repayment defaults and mismanagement, said the current situation would have been averted had the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) directed the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) to take 50 per cent responsibility of losses incurred by the farmers.
They, therefore, called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to intervene by prevailing on the CBN and NIRSAL to take necessary actions towards addressing the issue.
The ABP was funded by the CBN under the suspended governor of the apex bank, Mr. Godwin Emefiele.
In a statement released yesterday in Abuja by the chairman of the Concerned Rice Farmers of the North-East/Nigeria, Alhaji Mohammed Abba Liman, he said, “We appreciate the efforts of Mr. President and align with his policy initiatives in trying to reposition the agricultural sector of the economy and the Anchor Borrowers Programme (ABP) for the purpose of boosting food production in order to enhance national food security.”
The rice farmers said their members did not default or mismanage the loans but that they had suffered losses running into hundreds of millions of Naira on account of “insecurity and flooding” and that “NIRSAL which was created to provide insurance cover for all farmers in the agricultural sector has failed to intervene when farmers raised the issue of losses they incurred as a result of insecurity, flooding and COVID-19 pandemic”.
They lamented that “Boko Haram insurgency, banditry and conflicts between farmers and herders, as well as floods adversely affected their yields and harvest nationwide, especially in the North-East, North-West and North-Central”.
Liman said, “We however wish to categorically debunk reports in some certain quarters that portray rice farmers in the country in a wrong light, especially with regard to the ongoing investigation into the alleged mismanagement of the much commended Anchor Borrowers Programme (ABP).
“We invested our loans wisely and we have immensely contributed to the improved local rice production, creation of jobs and huge impacts on the national economy. And we have committedly sustained strong efforts towards paying back all loans from ABP.
“Our members have however incurred losses running into millions and billions of Naira as a result of insecurity and flooding in the country and we have not been able to get the attention of the authorities to look into these critical factors,” he said.
The chairman also said that rice farmers raised the alarm severally and wrote “complaint letters to former President Muhammadu Buhari alerting him on the threats of Boko Haram insurgency, banditry and the need to provide adequate security for the farmers and their farms but were never given attention”, he said.
The stakeholders also said that “the NIRSAL has not responded accordingly to the need to take 50 percent liability of the huge losses incurred by farmers until all the loans are fully repaid according to the provisions of the law. Justice should be done”.
They hailed ABP, saying that despite all the challenges occasioned by the global pandemic, COVID-19, rice farmers braved the odds and enhanced local production of rice and subsequent banning of importation of rice.
The ABP, the farmers said, “contributed immensely in tackling food crisis and widespread hunger in Nigeria occasioned by COVID-19”.
Shettima also said farmers made history through the ABP by organising Africa’s first rice pyramids at the Abuja International Trade Fair in 2021, commissioned by the then President Buhari.
While they pledged to support the president’s agricultural policy initiatives and mobilise rice farmers in Nigeria to support his government, they called on him to intervene in this matter.
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