A CRITICAL ASSESSMENT OF THE SURVIVAL STRATEGIES OF DEPOSIT MONEY BANKS IN A DEPRESSED ECONOMY WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE FIRST BANK OF NIGERIA PLC

A CRITICAL ASSESSMENT OF THE SURVIVAL STRATEGIES OF DEPOSIT MONEY BANKS IN A DEPRESSED ECONOMY WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE FIRST BANK OF NIGERIA PLC

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1   BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

Nigerian economy is faced with national and global economic challenges and as such, the financial institutions, especially the banking sector has an option of sanitizing and restructuring its operational processes in order to survive the depressed economy, as well as embarking on a consolidation exercise which would have some wider structural effects on the industry and on the economy as a whole.  Basically, banking is a service industry operated by human beings for the benefit of the general public while making returns to the shareholders.  As such, it is natural that the services provided thereof by the industry cannot be 100% efficient; however, there is always a room for improvement.  It is on this statement that the index of our further discussion on this study is based.

The banking sector in the third world economies has been grossly under managed when compared with their counterparts in the developed countries of the world.  This has made it imperative for Nigerian banks to sanitize and restructure their operational processes so as to be in line with the global trends, and to survive the depressed economy. Before the introduction of Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) in 1986, the banking sector was characterized by few banks.   The operators of these banks had almost total control of the business of banking as customers had to look for their services which most of the times were of poor quality.  The managers, because of the pressure to provide banking services, had little time to market their bank services or design new products to improve their customers’ service and at the same time, they received changes based on the approved tariff. Competition was minimal and customers could spend long hours trying to obtain service in the banking hall due to long queues.

The quality of the bank staff was poor.