Wema Bank doles out N90m largesse to cushion biting poverty
With fuel price rising over 150 per cent in the last one month and impacting negatively on purchasing power of millions of Nigerians, Wema Bank has rolled out an initiative to enable its customers earn extra.
The move, according to the bank, is to help them with funds to subsidize their businesses, pay bills and survive the hard times.
Recall that Nigerians have been faced with mounting inflation after the government announced the removal of subsidy on imported fuel, also known as Premium Motor Spirit. The situation was further worsened when the government jettisoned the fixed foreign exchange rate and adopted the floating model for the Naira. This has caused prices of imported goods to soar.
A recent report of the World Bank said at least 4 million Nigerians were pushed into poverty in the first half of 2023, and another 7.1 million likely to join this ‘great army of the poor people’ if nothing is done to stem the tide.
Wema bank at the weekend said its intervention scheme, tagged 5for5, would help their customers win up to N1 million in a promo that would run for 10 months. A whooping N90 million has been set aside for the project, the bank said.
The bank’s Divisional Head of Retail, Ayodele Olojede, said: “Today in the demonstration of the testatement of our bank commitment to continuously reward customers, especially when you are transacting, we are going to be rewarding over 300 million customers on a monthly basis. On monthly basis, customers stand the chance to win up to N1 million. N1 million in today’s economy, you can imagine what that will do. It can help you to either subsidize your business, help you to pay school fees or help you to have fun. It doesn’t matter what challenges you are going through with the economy, Wema bank is here to support you and to continually help position our customers not to feel the pangs of the challenges we are going through today.”
The bank’s Executive Director, Finance & Digital Optimization, Tunde Mabawonku, represented by Olusegun Adeniyi, Wema Bank Chief Digital Officer, said the scheme is an avenue to connect to customers, meet their needs, improve their quality of lives and show appreciation for their loyalty.