The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) says it allocates new naira notes to banks on a daily basis.
CBN Director, Consumer Protection, Mrs Rashidat Monguno, said this in Offa, Kwara State, on Thursday, attributing scarcity of the redesigned notes to sabotage by some commercial banks.
Monguno, who was on an exercise to monitor microfinance banks, said, ”There is naira out there, I have been in Kwara for over three weeks now and we have been allocating money daily.
”But now, everybody collecting the naira is hoarding it. So, no matter how much naira we put out there, if we continue with this attitude and the CBN issues from now till December, it will still not be enough.
”Because of this attitude, even those that don’t really need the money are rushing to get it and keep, not to spend.
“Currency management is a cycle but we have not allowed the cycle to mature. When you issue out currency as CBN, what we expect is that the naira issued out will come back into the banking system again.
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”And you know that in every economy, you must have proper accountability on the indent.
”You just don’t issue out naira for the fun of it, you issue the amount that is commensurate with the level of activity you have in that country.”
The CBN Director added that the situation could only get better when people start spending money already hoarded because enough money was already in circulation.
She added that the CBN was already engaging traditional rulers to sensitise their people to have a positive attitude and be confident that the naira redesign policy was not to punish anyone but to better the economy.
In his remark, the Olofa of Offa, Oba Gbadamosi Esuwoye II, said the extension of the legality of the old notes from Jan. 31 to Feb. 10 is responsible for the problems people are facing currently.
He said people had already deposited all that they had on January 30 in anticipation to start spending the new notes in February hoping that it would be available, but it’s not so.
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