Economic Confidential, May, 2009

PROFILE

ABDULSALAM Y. AHMED – The Top Banker in FMBN

By Labaran Saleh

The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) is the first operator in the Nigeria's formal institutional mortgage lending sector. It started operations in 1956 as Nigerian Building Society. Its ownership structure comprises: Federal Government of Nigeria- 50%, Central Bank of Nigeria- 30%, Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund-20%. The Authorized Share Capital is N5 billion

Recently the Federal Government announced a substantive Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer to the bank. He is Abdulsalam Ahmed. He is a professional banker with over 19 years’ experience in the Nigerian banking sector. He was until his appointment the pioneer General Manager, Policy and Strategy of the FMBN, a position he held since January 2006 with responsibilities for policy and strategy formulation, corporate planning, overseeing the implementation of a prudent risk management framework for the Bank, monitoring operational procedures and accreditation of the Bank’s business relationship partners to mention a few; all with a view to successfully restructuring and repositioning the FMBN to meet Nigeria’s housing finance challenges.

The Bank has a history of retail, supervisory, regulatory and wholesale activities in the country's mortgage industry. The funding vehicle for its wholesale mortgage lending is the National Housing Trust Fund (NHTF). It currently performs mainly secondary mortgage and capital market operations.

Before joining the FMBN, Mr. Ahmed was the Divisional Head of the Risk Management Group of Unity Bank Plc. and was Assistant General Manager and Head, Risk Assets Management Department of the defunct First Interstate Bank Plc. prior to its merger with other banks to form the Unity Bank. His other career milestones include serving in various capacities in the Credit Division and Ilorin branch of the former Habib Nigeria Bank where he rose to become the pioneer Head, Corporate Finance and Special Loans Unit of the bank in 1996; the construction, services and public sector group of the defunct NAL Bank Plc. where he participated in many capital market issues, financial advisory, treasury as well as credit and marketing activities and in 1999 he became pioneer Abuja branch manager of Stanbic Bank Ltd. (member of the Standard Bank Group of South Africa)in which capacity he doubled as Head, Corporate Finance, Northern Nigeria with responsibility for identification of corporate and project finance opportunities, maintaining interface with regulatory authorities and marketing funds under asset management and custody services.

One may ask the reason for appointing a professional banker into the helms of affairs in FMBN. The reason is clear. Some of the mandates of the Bank include linking the capital market with the housing markets, encouraging the emergence and promoting the growth of viable primary mortgage loan originators to serve the needs for housing delivery in Nigeria, mobilizing domestic and foreign funds into the housing sector and collecting and administering the NHF in accordance with the provisions of the NHF Act.

Mr. Ahmed has attended various proficiency training programmes in the United Kingdom, the Middle East, Asia and the USA, including the 2007 Housing Finance course of the Wharton School of Real Estate, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA, which knowledge he has brought to bear in complementing the implementation of the various housing-related reforms concerning the FMBN. Mr. Ahmed has also written a number of unpublished academic papers in the fields of behavioural, corporate and international finance.

An alumnus of a number of prestigious educational institutions, Mr. Ahmed holds an M.Sc. in Corporate and International Finance from the University of Durham, England; an M.Sc. in Agricultural Economics from Nigeria’s premier university, the University of Ibadan; an MBA from the Bayero University, Kano; and a B.Sc. in Agricultural Economics from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. He is a full member of the Nigerian Institute of Management (Chartered).

He is happily married with children.