The Managing Director, Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation, Alhaji Umaru Ibrahim, has said the agency had paid ₦105bn to 442,615 depositors of closed Deposit Money Banks end of September 2017.
Similarly, the corporation paid a cumulative sum of ₦2.88bn to 525,009 depositors of closed microfinance banks as well as ₦60m to 756 depositors of closed Primary Mortgage Banks.
Ibrahim, who made the disclosure at the NDIC Special Day at the ongoing 38th Kano International Trade Fair in Kano, with the theme, ‘Reinvigoration of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises: A Key for Effective Development of the Nigerian Economy’, urged depositors of any closed bank, who had yet to claim their trapped funds to file their claims.
“It is equally important to draw the attention of members of the public to take advantage of the numerous incentives available to save and have financial services. Depositors are also guaranteed by the NDIC in the event of bank failure up to a minimum if ₦500,000 for commercial, merchant/mortgage banks/mobile banking subscribers, and ₦200,000 in a microfinance bank.
Ibrahim explained that the corporation had paid liquidation dividends to customers, whose deposits were in excess of the insured sums upon the sale of the fiscal assets of the closed banks and debt recovery.
However, he stressed the need for depositors to patronise only financial institutions licensed by the Central Bank of Nigeria and which display the NDIC sticker, ‘Insured by NDIC’, in their banking halls and entrances, so as to avoid dubious fund managers, otherwise known as ‘wonder banks’.