ADDIS ABABA – The Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) said the number of its nationwide full-fledged Interest-Free Banking (IFB) branches has reached 36 during the past three months.
In an exclusive interview with The Ethiopian Herald, CBE IFB Vice President Nuri Hussein said that the bank has been hugely engaged in the establishment and expansion of full-fledged IFB branches in a view to satisfying customer’s requests and ensuring service quality.
The branch expansion is also aimed at attracting new and unbanked customers, safeguarding Sharia Compliance requirements and running the IFB business independently, the Vice President added. “Currently, CBE has 11 full-fledged IFB dedicated branches in Addis Ababa and surrounding and additional 25 in all over the country,” he said, adding that more 18 branches will be operationalized in the coming 3rd quarter of the current fiscal year.
Nuri pointed out that whilst more than 340 million Birr was mobilized in the IFB dedicated branches during the past three months, over 10,700 new customers opened accounts in those branches. Thus, the branch establishment has been playing an instrumental role enabling the bank to increase customer base in the non-interest-wing to over 2.4 million in the end of 2019.
Strong awareness raising activities that have been carried out by the bank and the Sharia Advisory Committee have played a pivotal role in ensuring Sharia matters thereby building customer’s trust in the services that are being provided in IFB branches. The activities are also beneficial in curtailing the doubt some clients had in the window system.
“CBE has been hugely engaged in financing Halal businesses and has so far disbursed close to two billion Birr to IFB customers,” the VP noted, adding that more finance is in the pipeline to support business and investment projects.
Apart from the mushrooming full-fledged IFB branches, CBE is also the champion in mobilizing deposit through the non-interest windows and currently 1,676 windows have been providing the service across the country. The total amount of money deposited in the window system reached over 27.5 billion Birr in December 2019.
Nuri stated that the bank has been closely working with the Sharia Advisory Committee, Chaired by Ethiopian Islamic Affairs Supreme Council Vice President Dr. Jeylan Kedir, to ensue Sharia Compliance and involved to introduce new IFB products and services.
CBE has also been heavily investing in capacity building programs and it has been offering trainings for the staff in a view to enabling them to provide world class services both in the IFB branches and in the window system, the VP remarked.
CBE is Ethiopia’s biggest bank and it is pioneering and deepening the establishments of full-fledged IFB branches in the country ever since it inaugurated Bilal Branch last September.
The Ethiopian Herald, January 28/2020
BY BILAL DERSO
