Hammed Shittu in Ilorin
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has attributed the continued scarcity of new naira notes to hoarding in certain quarters of the country.
The Director, Consumer Protection, CBN Ilorin Branch, Mrs Rashidat Mongunu, made the disclosure during monitoring exercises on some micro-finance banks at Offa, the headquarters of Offa Local Government of Kwara State.
The monitoring team first paid homage to the Olofa of Offa, Oba Mufutau Gbadamosi, before heading to Stockcorp Microfinance Bank and Ibolo Microfinance Bank.
She said the redesigned naira notes have been made available by the CBN, but the hoarders are making it look scarce, while the people throng the banks to collect money almost at the same time.
According to her, ”Because of the attitude of some Nigerians in hoarding the money, 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, because when you issue out currency as CBN, what we expect is that the naira issued out will come back into the banking system again.
”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.
”And you know that in every economy, you must have a proper accountabiliy.
”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 started spending money already hoarded because enough money was already in circulation.
”There is naira out there, I have been in Kwara for over three weeks and we have been allocating money daily.
”The truth is that if the currency is circulating the way it should and not being hoarded, we shouldn’t have a problem.
”The only thing is for us to change our attitude because it can only get better when people start spending the money they have hoarded,” Mrs Mongunu said.
She added that the CBN was already engaging traditional rulers to sensitive 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, said the extension of the legality of the old notes from January 31 to February 10 was responsible for the problems people are facing currently.
He said people had already deposited all the cash they had on January 30 in anticipation of spending the new notes on February 1 hoping that it would be available, but it was not so.
The traditional ruler however advised that if the CBN wants the policy to be received with open arms and successful, it should make the new notes available for people to spend.
