Allow refugees to use movable assets to access credit, banks told
A global financial body, Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) is fronting a plan to compel refugee host countries to formulate special policies that allow forcibly displaced persons to access financial services with ease.
The head of the Alliance for Financial Inclusion in Africa, Mr James Ivan Setimba says currently, the refugees face a lot of challenges in accessing financial services in their respective host countries because of the stringent laws surrounding access to finance from banks, and SACCOS among others.
He says the required policy is seeking the respective countries to allow refugees to use their properties at their disposal such as goats, and television as collateral to access credit, despite the fact that banks need land, among other items.
“It means they have challenges accessing loans because they don’t have collateral such as land. For instance, they might, especially those who are outside Kampala might have movable assets like goats and TVs – they can actually use that as some kind of collateral to access loans,”
He made the remarks, at the opening of the four-day meeting, where the Alliance for Financial Inclusion is meeting top leaders of central banks from Africa, Uganda inclusive discuss the same.
He asked central banks across the globe to formulate such policies to give the refugees access to credit.
