New database, Debtors Africa, launched to expose defaulting debtors
Debtors Africa, a searchable database of recalcitrant and delinquent debtors in Africa, has been launched, alongside a report on the debt/non-performing loans situation in the Nigerian banking industry.
The report, which was done in partnership with Proshare, represents a culmination of a detailed review of the credit experiences of local Nigerian banks in the last two decades.
It also reveals the challenges of a local lending cycle that has seen lenders become victims of the tyranny of bad and delinquent debtors, according to a statement on Monday.
The report makes a case for a new approach to the lending cycle to ensure that integrity, professionalism and evidence-based best lending practices are strictly followed to guarantee the sustainability of the financial system and the prosperity of the larger economy.
The Debtors Africa website is a searchable database of delinquent borrowers that enables speedy assessment of the character of a prospective customer, according to Proshare.
The statement said, “Of equal importance is that investors can use the database as a starting node for assessing the quality of the management of a business they intend to either partner or invest in.
“The searchable database is designed to allow contributors such as banks, loan fintech and credit companies, cooperatives, tax authorities, private businesses, government agencies and utility providers, among others, list their delinquent debtors and their indebtedness on the platform as a contributor to the platform.
“With this listings, a moral and business burden is placed on delinquent borrowers as prospective lenders would use the library to fact-check the borrowing history of a loan applicant and use the history to set up a character rating index that would guide credit appraisal memorandums and inform acceptance or decline of credit requests.”
The statement noted that the names of delinquent debtors had over the years been published on various media platforms with no central portal to harness the information published or achieve the desired objectives of creditors.
“With DebtorsAfrica, the new model provides a central hub to access this information and goes beyond naming and so-called ‘shaming’ to informingprospective creditors and other institutions that require character validation, while name removal from the database is subject to the review and removal by the contributor after debt resolution is attained,” it said.
