SAT. 11 FEB, 2023-theGBJournal| The Central Bank of Nigeria’ (CBN) Governor, Godwin Emefiele, has admitted the incompetence of the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc to deliver on the new naira, echoing President Muhammadu Buhari’s fears on why the country is suffering acute cash shortages.
The President, last week told the All Progressives Congress (APC) Governors who visited the State House to lay complain on the naira crunch, that when he considered giving approval to the naira swap policy, he demanded an undertaking from the CBN Governor that no new notes will be printed outside the country and they (CBN) in turn gave him assurances that there was enough capacity, manpower and equipment to print the currency for local needs.
The now frustrated President subsequently took a swipe at the CBN for failure to keep its assurance that the country has the capacity to print the new notes.
At Friday’s meeting between the National Council of State and the President, the CBN Governor admitted that the capacity didn’t exist.
‘’That confirms our fears that the Governor has no clue about the consequences of his deadline policy,’’ a source familiar with the meeting told theG&BJournal. ‘’He should resign or be sacked. He has simply set the country’s economy backward and willfully brought pain and hardship on the populace. Better still, he should be arrested and tried for economic sabotage.’’
The CBN Governor told the Council, our sources said, that Mint ran out of papers and orders has been placed with a German firm and a UK firm.
‘’What this means is that the crunch will last as long as the fuel crisis the country faces today,’’ our source said.
The CBN Governor up until recently had insisted that the deadline set for the Naira swap will stay. On Friday the Council of State ordered the apex bank to circulate the old notes alongside the new notes and print more new notes.
The Council’ ambiguous statement left many even more confused, not knowing whether to accept the new notes or reject them.
Analysts say the confusion arising from these types of policy statement gives opportunities to unscrupulous individuals and groups to exploit vulnerable Nigerians.
Twitter-@theGBJournal| Facebook-the government and Business Journal|email:gbj@govbusinessjournal.ng|govandbusinessj@gmail.com
