The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has unveiled the Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) code for its eNaira, stressing that the initiative will engender financial inclusion and support poverty reduction policies in the country.
It said about 45 percent of adult Nigerians do not have a bank account while 35.9 per cent are excluded from formal financial services.
Delivering the keynote address at the official unveiling ceremony held in Kano on Thursday, the Deputy Governor of CBN (Operations), Mr. Folashadun Adebisi Shonubi, noted that the launch of the code was a significant milestone in achieving the objective of the second phase of the eNaira project which is to drive financial inclusion by onboarding unbanked and underserved users leveraging the offline channels.
Despite the huge number of adult Nigerians without any bank account, the apex bank noted that research has shown that around 81 per cent of the adult population in Nigeria own mobile phones with about 150 million Mobile Subscribers in the country. “Therefore, the eNaira seeks to leverage the huge opportunity mobile telecommunications presents as a distribution channel for the offering of digital financial services to the underserved and unbanked population.
“Specifically, we are here to launch the eNaira USSD channel using *997# for onboarding and transactions,” he said.
He added that the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS) Instant payment solution would be available before the end of August, which he said will allow eNaira users to seamlessly transact between the eNaira and any bank of their choice.
Daily Trust reports that President Muhammadu Buhari launched the eNaira on October 25, 2021, making Nigeria the first African country to launch a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC).
Speaking on behalf of all the Market Associations in Kano, Alhaji Saleh Kura, promised the full support of the market people to the initiative and said they hope the initiative will help address the issue of Naira defacing.
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