Nigeria‘s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo has described the criticism of the TraderMoni microcredit scheme by former President Olusegun Obasanjo as an “absurdity”.

Osinbajo said to label such “people-friendly” scheme as “idiotic” is also an affront to the sensibilities of hardworking Nigerians who are beneficiaries of the micro-credit scheme.

Naija News reports that Osinbajo made this statement in a rejoinder issued on Monday night by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande.

This online news platform recalls that Obasanjo had berated Osinbajo over the “suspect timing” of the implementation of the Trader Moni scheme in an open letter titled “Point for Concern and Action”.

The former president had said Osinbajo’s action, shows that the Vice President must have gone for, “if you can’t beat them, join them”.

Reacting on Monday night Osinbajo’s spokesman noted that “it is either that the former leader is ignorant of the true workings of Trader Moni and the role of the Vice President in its implementation or perhaps he is on a mischievous mission.”


Akande said the former President has demonstrated “a surprising but complete misunderstanding of the workings of TraderMoni, that is if we assume there is no mischief intended.”

He said: “Firstly, the Vice President does not personally distribute money during his visits to the markets. He goes there to assess the progress of the implementation and to create awareness for a programme designed to meet the financing need of 2 million petty traders across the country in the first instance.

“Secondly, while one will not bother to further address the issue of timing of the implementation since such issues are now known to be political posturing, it is important to note that TraderMoni is being actively implemented across all states of the federation and the FCT. It is not only Lagos and Abuja as was insinuated.

“These petty traders at the bottom of the economic ladder, with an inventory often less than N5,000, are beneficiaries of the TraderMoni scheme which provides N10,000 collateral/interest-free loans to them, empowerment that improves their small businesses, their families, while also contributing significantly to the economy.

“Thirdly, in what is certainly a curious comment, the former President has also been quoted as describing the TraderMoni scheme as idiotic. To label such people-friendly scheme as idiotic is not only an absurdity, it is also an affront to the sensibilities of these hard working Nigerians, the beneficiaries of the micro-credit scheme.