The Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions has justified the existence of the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) despite the challenges confronting the agency.
AMCON is saddled with the statutory responsibility amongst others, of recovering the non-performing loan hitherto disbursed by eligible financial institutions (Banks) to their customers.
The managing director of the agency, Ahmed Kuru, led top officials of the agency to the Senate Wednesday to present his 2023 financial records and to defend the 2024 budget estimates.
Some members of the Senate panel expressed dissatisfaction with the agency’s performance in the outgoing fiscal year and wondered if it would not be better for the National Assembly to scrap it.
For instance, a member of the committee, Senator Sani Musa, wondered while, despite its huge liabilities, AMCON was not aggressive enough in its loan recovery drives.
He said, “Most of the loans were owed by individual companies which were never sanctioned and at the end of the day, the same company would go back to buy back their asset that AMCON had hitherto taken over. Are we going to continue like this?
“It is not only about defending budget, it is about seeing the effect of the Appropriation, we need to know whether it is working. Or are we just creating a job for those we can protect?
“Will it not be better to scrap AMCON since it seems to have lost its statutory mandate?
Speaking in similar vein, another member of the committee, Senator Jimoh Ibrahim, lamented the huge losses suffered by the assets recovery agency in the outgoing fiscal year.
