Feature/OPED
The Future of Widows in Delta State
By Jerome-Mario Chijioke Utomi
Regardless of the recent onslaughts recorded against the rights of Nigerian women in Nigeria, with the most painful example being the lawmakers in both Senate and House of Representatives’ rejection of bills that sought to grant special seats for women in the legislature and 35 per cent party leadership during the voting on 68 amendments, recommended in the report recently submitted by the Special Ad Hoc Committees on the Review of the 1999 Constitution, Mr Ifeanyi Okowa, the Governor of Delta State has, however, shown that there exists a ray of political and socioeconomic hope for Nigerian women, particularly widows in Delta State.
Aside from that, Governor Okowa has in the past sustainably manifested leadership traits that qualify as people-focused, a recent telephone talk with Elder Isioma Okonta, the Governor’s Senior Special Assistant on Social Investment Programme and Coordinator of Delta State Widows Welfare Scheme, further demonstrates beyond reasonable doubt that he is a believer in the words of the late former Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN), Mr Kofi Annan, that there is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women, and no other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity or to reduce infant and maternal mortality’.
For a better understanding of the piece, a report recently noted that a widow is a woman who has lost her husband by death and has not remarried. Widows, it added, are invisible in society. They are scattered across the globe, owing to their condition and the enormous challenges, reproach and shame the majority of them are undergoing.
For widows to secure expectations by keeping their hopes alive by way of feeding, providing accommodation and qualitative education for their children, they must assume the position of their dead husband who happened to be the breadwinner.
Speaking on how the state government decided on a life-changing scheme, widely known as ‘Widows Alert’ in 2018 to provide succour and wipe away their tears, remedy their despair and perplexity, and assuage their hunger, he explained that the initiative by the governor is taking care of the poor and vulnerable widows in Delta State and cut across the 25 Local Government Areas.
The communities are touched by this programme, which is non-political and cuts across religious lines, taking care of stipends of the widows monthly.
The widows can benefit from free healthcare. The premium of this healthcare is born by the governor by way of the Delta State contributory healthcare. So, even if the widows have to undergo surgical operations, it is free of charge and we have 5,607 widows enrolled in this scheme.
On how the state tracks those that are real widows, he explained that the names of these widows before now were drawn from the communities in Delta State. And the state makes sure the community leaders are involved to help ascertain the veracity of the widows. To those that are saying they are widows, indeed and to those that are saying they are poor and vulnerable widows, the community leaders are there to ascertain those points.
He stressed that the state does not draw up a list without making sure the community leaders are cross-checking the facts. And recently, the Governor brought in a consultant to conduct an integrated service.
It is saddled with the responsibility of coming up with an electronic database of widows across Delta State. So, today, it has rounded up its work and we have over 50,000 widows in the Delta State widow’s electronic database.
So, we now have a compendium of widows that have been electronically generated. This database is used as a veritable tool for the government to make decisions and plans concerning the widows.
On Governor Okowa’s style of supporting the project, he captures it this way; The Governor is the reason for the success of the programme. You know, Okowa is an astute Chief Executive, and for every aspect of governance that is involved, there is a feedback mechanism that has been set up by him.
Whenever there is a programme, the governor doesn’t just keep the programme. He pays attention to every detail of the program. The structure we have today in the widow’s welfare scheme has been set up solely by Okowa.
Apart from me being the State Coordinator, there are three supervisors, each supervisor is in charge of each senatorial district in every local government, there are two Coordinators that are saddled with the responsibility of taking care of the affairs of these widows and we have very little or no complaint coming from the widows. Dr Okowa is the reason why the program is successful.
Continuing, he said; when you look at before 2018, the issue of widows in Delta State was not known by anybody. Widows are part of our society that nobody cares about. Their welfare was not taken care of by anybody. Then, Okowa changed the narrative. When he came in, he has been able to make sure that the poorest of the poor among these widows their issues have been brought to the front burner. Now, every year on June 23rd, we participate in International Widows Day. They have been recognized by the United Nations, a day to remember the issue of widows.
The Governor is the first among the 36 states in the federation to observe this day. He is the only governor that has a programme of this nature where widows are paid monthly, where the healthcare benefits of these widows are taken care of monthly.
In other states, you might have the governors taking care of widows only in seasonal times, like Christmas and Easter or during electioneering periods. But Governor Okowa has made sure that the issue of widows has been brought to the front burner.
What happens with this? There is a lot of violent crying out there from elements brought about by wrong parenting, when a home loses a father, remaining only the woman, and the woman is not able to take care of the children. What happens to the children? It is either the young girls go into prostitution or the young boys go into robbery. They go out there, trying to swindle people.
When Okowa started taking care of widows, you can see that the narrative has changed and the life of these widows have witnessed a new beginning. So, a lot of landmarks have been set since the widows in Delta State have become part of the political system.
He has reached out to life. He has touched the untouchable. He has dropped Delta State from a point where the roads are not ploughable to a point where there is a massive construction of roads everywhere.
He has touched the youths in Delta State through several programmes. He has made sure that programmes for the girl child have emanated in Delta State where the girl child is no longer dependent on her parents.
Business opportunities have been provided for them. Okowa has made sure that there is peace in all those areas. He has done well.
I think this programme has come to stay. I think the way Okowa structured this programme, anybody that takes over from him must keep the programme going. In his wisdom, he appointed the Commissioner for Humanitarian Services to oversee this and of course, widows’ welfare is part of humanitarian services.
So, you can see how detailed the governor is. You can see he is looking into putting in place structures that will make sure the widows’ welfare scheme will not fade away. With the structures on the ground by the governor, I think the programme is sustainable.
Utomi Jerome-Mario is the Programme Coordinator (Media and Public Policy), the Social and Economic Justice Advocacy (SEJA). He can be reached via je*********@***oo.com or 08032725374
Feature/OPED
What Does Nigeria’s $51bn Reserves Milestone Mean if Most New Foreign Money Can Leave Quickly?
Nigeria’s foreign reserves have climbed to about $51 billion, a decade-plus high, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). EBC Financial Group (EBC) notes that this reflects stronger investor confidence, but the second half may show whether it holds, as the build rests on three cyclical drivers: oil earnings, short-term foreign money and a narrowing official-to-street naira gap.
Reserves rose from about $32 billion in April 2024, during a dollar shortage, to about $51 billion now, near the CBN’s target. Much came from two cyclical sources, strong oil earnings and money chasing high-yielding naira assets, so EBC expects the pace to slow or reverse. Fitch Ratings, a major international credit rating agency, expects a marginal decline to about $47 billion by the end of 2026, citing higher spending and external pressures.
David Precious, Senior Market Analyst at EBC Financial Group, said, “Nigeria’s reserve build is real but may not be durable yet, because nearly all of the new money is the kind that can leave quickly. Of the $10.37 billion that came in over the first quarter, the overwhelming majority was short-term portfolio funds rather than long-term investment, so a shift in oil prices, global interest rates or confidence in the naira might pull a large part of it straight back out.”
Most New Money Can Still Leave Quickly
The composition of the foreign inflows explains the caution over how long the build can last. The country attracted $10.37 billion in foreign investment in the first quarter of 2026, up 83.83 per cent year-on-year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). Of that, $9.86 billion or 95.09 per cent, was portfolio money, largely short-term naira debt such as Treasury bills that investors can sell at the next auction, while foreign direct investment, the long-term kind that builds factories and jobs, was $135.08 million, or 1.30 per cent. Put simply, of each dollar coming in, about 95 cents can leave quickly, and barely one cent stays.
That money supports reserves while it stays. Dollars brought in to buy naira assets add to market supply, letting the CBN hold more reserves and steady the naira. It leaves when conditions change. Nigeria earns most of its export dollars from oil and gas, so lower oil prices mean fewer dollars, and as a member of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), it cannot simply produce more, output capped by quota and reduced by theft and ageing fields. Higher global interest rates draw money toward safer returns abroad, and a weakening naira prompts investors to sell early. When oil fell in 2016 and 2020, foreign investors withdrew and could not convert naira to dollars as supply dried up, leaving the CBN to clear more than $7 billion in trapped obligations into 2024.
The Oil Boost is No Longer Certain
Oil looked like a dependable source of the dollars behind the reserves only months ago. Earlier in 2026, concern over disruption around the Strait of Hormuz lifted crude prices, and stronger receipts flowed in, with crude oil export earnings of $8.11 billion in the first quarter in the CBN’s balance-of-payments data. That support is now easing. The tension has subsided, and Brent traded near $72 on June 29, down about 24 per cent over the month, back to pre-conflict levels. With the price boost gone and output constrained, reserves are more exposed, leaning on non-oil earnings and investor patience rather than oil.
The Naira Still Trades at Two Prices
The naira has traded at two prices, an official rate and a higher parallel-market rate, and closing that gap into one trusted price is what many investors might watch most. Before committing funds, they may want assurance they can convert naira to dollars at a fair rate when they exit, and a wide gap revives the fear of being trapped that lingers from earlier shortages. The gap has narrowed to roughly N20 to N30, with the CBN’s official rate near N1,380 per dollar on June 26 against parallel-market quotes around N1,400. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) 2026 Article IV review urged Nigeria to depend less on this fast-moving portfolio money and to keep phasing out its multiple exchange-rate practices. The CBN’s Foreign Exchange Manual, in force from 1 June, is intended to make the market clearer, though such rules build confidence only once investors can freely trade dollars at the posted rate.
What could Make the Build Durable
A few signs that may show the build turning durable include a smaller gap between the official and street naira rates, more long-term foreign investment, and steadier oil earnings. A gap that stays small, now roughly N20 to N30, may mean investors trust the official rate and no longer need the street market. A clear rise in foreign direct investment, only $135 million last quarter against $9.86 billion of short-term money, might mean lasting capital is replacing funds that can leave at the next auction. Oil earnings that hold up, rather than sliding from the low $70s, should help keep reserves steady, since oil and gas bring in most of Nigeria’s export dollars.
“Reserves built on money chasing high yields can fall as fast as they rose, as they did after the last two oil shocks, when investors left, and the CBN spent years clearing a foreign-exchange backlog,” Precious added. “What holds through a downturn is slower money, direct investment, steady oil and non-oil export earnings and one credible naira rate, and that is the shift Nigeria has yet to make.”
By Olajumoke Bello
Across Nigeria, small and medium enterprises remain the backbone of economic activity. They drive trade, create jobs, and sustain millions of livelihoods. Yet, despite their importance, many SMEs continue to operate below their full potential due to persistent structural challenges.
Access to finance remains one of the most cited constraints. However, the issue today goes beyond the availability of capital. Many businesses struggle with financial readiness, weak documentation, and limited understanding of what lenders require. This often leads to missed opportunities, even when funding options exist.
At the same time, SMEs face gaps in market access and visibility. Business owners operate in highly localised environments, with limited exposure to broader networks that can unlock partnerships, new markets, and growth opportunities. This isolation can constrain scalability and reduce long-term competitiveness.
Equally important is the capability gap. Many entrepreneurs grow through resilience and experience but lack structured knowledge on critical areas such as financial management, export readiness, and digital adoption. Without this, even well-capitalised businesses can struggle to sustain growth.
These challenges point to a clear need for a more practical and integrated approach to SME support. It is no longer sufficient to offer standalone solutions. SMEs require ecosystems that combine knowledge, access, and direct engagement in ways that reflect how they actually operate.
A key shift is the move from centralised interventions to localised engagement. SMEs are deeply influenced by their immediate environments, whether markets, industrial clusters, or trade corridors. Solutions must therefore be brought closer to where these businesses function, allowing for more relevant support and stronger relationships.
Another important shift is from awareness to action. Business owners do not only need information; they need insights that they can apply immediately. This includes understanding how to structure their finances, how to access trade opportunities, and how to connect with the right partners to scale their operations.
There is also a growing need for continuity. Many SME-focused initiatives deliver strong initial impact but lack follow-through. For support to be effective, it must extend beyond one-off engagements into sustained relationships, with clear pathways for onboarding, advisory, and growth.
For financial institutions, this presents both responsibility and an opportunity. Supporting SMEs now requires moving beyond transactional banking to deeper partnership models. It requires understanding businesses at a granular level and co-creating solutions that evolve with their needs.
At Stanbic IBTC, this perspective continues to shape our approach to SME development. Our focus is on delivering practical support that translates into real business outcomes, helping enterprises grow, compete, and contribute more meaningfully to the economy.
As part of this commitment, we are extending our SME engagement to the regions through the Nigeria Business Summit Regional Tour. The tour will take structured, on-ground activations into key commercial hubs, where SMEs can access funding guidance, trade insights, advisory support, and direct engagement with financial experts.
The regional tour will take place across five strategic locations, bringing these solutions closer to business owners in Aba, Onitsha, Ibadan and Kano.
This approach reflects an important principle. When support moves closer to businesses and when solutions are delivered in ways that are practical and continuous, SMEs are better positioned to grow sustainably. In turn, this strengthens not only individual enterprises but the broader economy.
Olajumoke Bello is the Head of Enterprise Banking at Stanbic IBTC Bank
By Winston Osuchukwu
The average Nigerian borrower is widely considered high-risk – a claim repeated in credit committees, priced into retail loans, and largely treated as settled fact. Every credit market accepts that an individual loan may not be repaid; this is ordinary, priced risk. The high-risk claim, however, is applied to whole segments – the informal trader, the gig economy earner whose income is steady but split across several accounts, the remote worker paid by an overseas client into a fintech FX wallet. What the assessment establishes is not whether they are likely to repay, but how they fit into an arbitrary segment. Having spent years building decisioning systems for this market, my thesis is a specific one: “high-risk” does not mean “no credit” – it simply requires that the lender embrace alternative datasets to price the risk appropriately.
This is not a criticism of the institutions that built their frameworks around collateral and documentation; those were rational responses to the tools available at the time. When data is scarce, prudence means defaulting to the status quo. The limitation is not that this approach is wrong, but that it leaves a blind spot – excluding fundamentally sound borrowers whose economic lives simply are not captured on the bank’s ledger. A market trader who has moved consistent, growing volumes of cash through mobile money for three years is not, in any meaningful sense, unknowable. Their financial behaviour is observable and patterned; it simply occurs outside the traditional banking system, rendering it invisible to conventional underwriting.
This is the gap technology is now positioned to close – not by replacing institutional judgment, but by augmenting it. When AI-driven analysis is applied rigorously to the financial behaviour these borrowers generate, a far more complete picture of their repayment ability emerges – and a meaningful share presents a risk profile that compares favourably with segments the traditional system has long considered safe. The “high-risk” label, applied broadly to an entire category of borrower, was never a risk pricing tool so much as the limit of what the available tools could see.
For banks, this is the opportunity to extend capital with confidence beyond the borrowers who fit their stringent criteria. Nigerian banks are highly liquid; the constraint on credit growth has rarely been capital, but the ability to assess and price the borrowers who sit outside the traditional file. Close that gap, and the whole ecosystem strengthens: banks grow their loan books into segments they have long wanted to serve, and the real economy gets the capital it needs to expand.
This is precisely what we focus on at Mathesis Analytics: building AI-powered credit decisioning that gives lenders a fuller, more defensible picture of the individuals long excluded as high-risk when they were simply misjudged. The Nigerian credit gap has never been a non-lendable population problem, but one of incomplete visibility. By unifying varied data sources and partnering with the institutions that hold the capital and scale to move the market, we translate out-of-ecosystem behaviour into reliable, bank-grade risk scores. Closing this gap is one of the clearest, highest-leverage opportunities in Nigerian financial services today.
Winston Osuchukwu is the founder & CEO of Mathesis Analytics
