Urban Ministry (UM) ... At Work!

Moses Dahirong, from our Abuja office:

Urban Ministry (UM) Abuja continues to work with 25 communities and have been sustained over time. Some new communities have indicated their interest to register and collaborate with UM Abuja. This is because they consider the programs as beneficial with direct bearing on their lives and families. We hope to work with more communities as our resources improve.

There are clear dimensions of transformation being seen in the way the cooperatives; share the vision of Urban Ministry and involvement in self help projects, support church projects like building and support to widows/the needy in the community. They also transfer acquired skills during UM workshops to other members of the community. Community members are becoming more like a family, each willing to care for one another - visiting each other's homes, assistance during crisis and sharing in joys!


Emmanuel Agbinda, from our Lagos office:

UM has directly intervened to change some individual members whose situation was bad and pathetic. We were able to assist a widow without a child who was denied access to her late husband’s farm and small house. She was even stripped of her personal property by the her in-laws. UM was able to fight for her legal rights and she is now able to farm and be sustainable.

We continue to train members to acquire skills and become self-reliant. Training in bead-making, hats, body lotion, vaseline, cake and confectionaries, soap, etc were taught in several workshops held on small business management.

MFI 101: Basics

ACCESS Microfinance Alliance, or AmFA, (a not for profit organization from India at ACCESSdev.org) has been speaking into the Micro Finance Institutions (MFI) successfully for years.

What is it?
Although the microfinance sector is growing at a fair clip, many small MFIs still grapple to upscale their operations. Due to limitations in governance, management, systems and procedures, the smaller MFIs do not possess enough credibility to attract the financial markets effectively. AmFA’s primary mission is to bridge the gap between the supply and demand and help the smaller MFIs to upscale their operations and thereby expand outreach. While the nature of engagement of ACCESS with each of these institutions varies following the context, the aim is to bring NGO/MFI partners together on a common platform to assess institutional needs for technical support and present an aggregation of demand for on-lending funds to the financial markets.

Products and Services
AmFA adopts a two pronged strategy: while providing need based technical support to its members, it also builds operational and strategic relations with the supply side players to facilitate inflow of funds. In addition to the array of technical services provided to the MFIs, the AmFA members have a privileged access to a wider range of products and services:

Revolving Loan Fund

The platform allows the institutions to have access to a Revolving Loan Fund (RLF), currently housed in CARE. The fund provides “bridge loans” as an interim measure till the MFIs get linked to mainstream markets.

MFI performance analysis and benchmarking

ACCESS analyses AmFA members’ performance indicators, financial statements etc. and publishes the key performance ratios and indicators in an annual publication, MICROSCAN. Providing in-depth and complete financial analysis of partners’ portfolios, MICROSCAN is a part of ACCESS strategy to share partners’ plans and performances with the financial institutions and fostering possible on-lending relationship with AmFA partners.

Facilitation of on-lending fund linkages

Being able to attract investments is one of the biggest challenges for nascent, emerging as well as growing microfinance institutions. ACCESS assists AmFA members in getting linked to commercial banks for investments and on-lending fund support.

Information Dissemination

ACCESS took initiatives to disseminate the respective performance data of its members on large database such as “MIX”, and portals such as “Microfinance Gateway”. Portfolio information of members is shared with financial institutions and published in the “Alliance Directory”. Special individual member achievements are published in “AmFA Line”, a quarterly newsletter.

City of God... City of Satan

This is an excerpt from the book "City of God, City of Satan" by Robert C. Linthicum:

Jerusalem is seen in its idealized form as the city of God. It is introduced in Genesis (14:17-24) in the figure of Melchizedek, king of Salem (Salem is the former name of Jerusalem). The entire biblical drama concludes in the last chapters of the book of Revelation with the vision of “the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God” (Rev. 21:2).

The traditional interpretation given to the name of Jerusalem is “city of peace”. But biblical scholars such as Millar Burrows have pointed out that the name actually means “foundation of Shalem.” The traditional interpretation, “city of peace,” is etymologically unfounded.

The first references to Jerusalem in the Bible are found in Genesis 14:18 and Psalm 76:2, where it is called in Hebrew Shalem (in English, “Salem”)... The earliest known names for Jerusalem were Urushalim (the Egyptian Execration Texts, c. 1850 B.C.E.) or Shalem. Apparently the city received the name Jerusalem only after King David annexed it to Israel and made it his capital (2 Sam. 5:6-12).

Since the root name for Jerusalem is Urushalim or Shalem, we have to ask the question, “Who or what is Shalem?” Shalem was the local god of pre-Israelite Canaan. It was the god symbolized in the planet Venus, the evening star.

Does the name Jerusalem have anything to do with peace? Obviously the Hebrew words shalem and shalom (“peace”) are virtually identical. Is there a relationship? Apparently there is. In the Canaanite language, the god’s name Shalem actually meant “completion”. This meaning evolved from the Canaanites’ perception of Shalem as Venus, the evening star – which completed the day. Therefore, as time went on and language evolved, the word shalem came to be identified with a place – Jerushalem – and with the concept of “completion” of “fulfillment”. This became the base for the later Israelite word shalom or “peace”. But one should not then make the mistake of assuming that the name of David’s city was Jerushalom. It was not. It was Jerushalem.

If the city Urushalim of Shalem means “foundation of Shalem,” of the city of Shalem, what, then, does the prefix Je mean? It is the anglicized version of the Yah and thus an abbreviation for the word Yahweh! When King David conquered Jerusalem, he added the name of his and Israel’s God to the name of a city that previously had been named for the god Shalem. The name Yahweh was not substituted for the name of Shalem; it was added to it!

In the very name Jerusalem is expressed the tension of every city. It is Je-rusalem – the city of Yahweh, of God. It is Jeru-salem – the city of Baal (or Satan). Jerusalem is the city of Yahweh. Jerusalem is the city of Baal. It is a city that contains the power and influence of both forces within its walls. The very name of Israel’s primary (and idealized) city expresses the foundational urban message of the Bible. Jerusalem – and every city – is the battleground between God and Satam for domination of its people and their structures.

What is Microfinance?

From microfinancegateway.org

“Microfinance” is often defined as financial services for poor and low-income clients. In practice, the term is often used more narrowly to refer to loans and other services from providers that identify themselves as “microfinance institutions” (MFIs). These institutions commonly tend to use new methods developed over the last 30 years to deliver very small loans to unsalaried borrowers, taking little or no collateral. These methods include group lending and liability, pre-loan savings requirements, gradually increasing loan sizes, and an implicit guarantee of ready access to future loans if present loans are repaid fully and promptly.

More broadly, microfinance refers to a movement that envisions a world in which low-income households have permanent access to a range of high quality financial services to finance their income-producing activities, build assets, stabilize consumption, and protect against risks. These services are not limited to credit, but include savings, insurance, and money transfers.

The Future of Urban Ministry in Nigeria

FOR OVER 15 YEARS Urban Ministry (UMN) has been developing Nigerians. Since it's inception CRWRC and CRWM created and sustained Urban Ministry.

Empowering impoverished communities in Jos, Lagos, Abuja, and Makurdi through adult literacy, small scale business development, discipleship training and community leadership development.

Funding and capacity development has primarily come from these two organizations, but over time a few other agencies have contributed. For example, Oikonomos Foundation contributed greatly to the establishment of the Makurdi offices. Then, Kiva made an attempt towards micro-finance (but they lacked focus).

So, now there is hope but also a bit of apprehension. Funds do not make or break an organization, but can severely effect it. Funding will diminish significantly over the course of the next two years and UMN will need to prove itself to the world.

Continue to pray for direction and success!