The Confederation of Financial Institutions deploys SAB-AT software in Burkina Faso

At the beginning of his speech in Burkina Faso, the Director-General of the CIF-WA, Mathieu Soglonou, said that the software will make transactions possible 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for all the apex members of the CIF-WA network. The software will be extended to the entire CIF-WA Network established in Senegal, Mali, Togo, and Benin, from 2021.

Reduction of waiting time at the counters, possibility to make transactions remotely and with a smartphone, possibility to make transactions in the CIF network in West Africa, when the interconnection between networks will be established, and so on. These are some of the advantages that this software offers to the customer.

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The software was operational in the country since August 17th, 2020

According to Azaratou Nignan/Sondo, General Manager of the umbrella organization of the Caisses Populaires du Burkina (FCPB), the software has been operational in Burkina since August 17th, 2020, for all outlets of FCPB members. The speed of transactions, the possibility to operate anywhere a credit union is located without having to go back to its base credit union, are the advantages that customers are already benefiting from. The processing of credits will be automated and in the long run, customers will be able to build their own credit files, said Azaratou Nignan/Sondo.

For this pilot phase in Burkina, the representatives of the apex members of the CIF-WA network, who came from the four other countries, confided that they were moved by the quality and services offered by the caisses of the apex of the caisses populaires du Burkina (FCPB) which they were able to visit. With SAB-AT, the future can be viewed with greater serenity, according to these eyewitnesses, for whom, they said, there is a need to better organize themselves, take up the challenge of connectivity and that of adapting their products and services.

The participants, composed of Burkinabè and representatives of the umbrella members of the CIF-WA, from the four other countries, congratulated the Burkina network which played the role of pioneer.

The project cost about $18 million (10 billion FCFA) in equity

The Chairman of the Board of Directors of CIF-AO, Mamadou Moustapha Niang, said: “We are setting up a system of financing and savings, but also a system of social resilience, and this is what is needed for African economies too exposed to risks and natural disasters.”

He added that these innovations are also in line with the demands of the times. “The world today is changing. And when you are not able to transform and adapt, you are going to disappear,” he added.

The CIF-WA has more than 4.5 million customers and $1.08 billion (600 billion FCFA) assets in 2019 and brings together six networks of savings and credit cooperatives and mutuals established in Burkina Faso, Mali, Benin, Togo and Senegal. With nearly 800 points of sale and more than 4.5 million customers called members, the network has reached, as of December 31st, 2019, more than 600 billion assets for an estimated equity of $294.1 million (163.5 billion FCFA).

At the same time, it mobilized $719.6 million (400 billion FCFA) in savings against outstanding credit of about $589.7 million (327.8 billion FCFA). As for the FCPB, it has more than 48 years of experience and is responsible for more than 70% of the microfinance sector in Burkina Faso. In 2019, the network collected $248.3 million (138 billion FCFA) in savings against $172.6 million (96 billion FCFA) in loans granted and has $395.8 million (200 billion FCFA) in assets.

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