Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja
The Coalition of Northern Groups (CNGs) has described the response by President Muhammadu Buhari to the Supreme Court judgment on the old naira notes as deceptive.
The president had in a statement issued recently by his Media Aide, Garba Shehu said, the CBN had no reason not to comply with court orders on the excuse of waiting for directives from the president.
But, the group in a statement issued yesterday, by its spokesperson, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, wondered why Buhari or the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele refused to address the nation on the new directive, the same way they did when they were imposing the policy on the nation.
It noted that it was curious that days after the said directive by the president, the naira scarcity was showing no sign of abating.
The group said: “Instead, the situation is worsening by the day, as both the old and new notes are deliberately withheld by government.
“And while innocent families go hungry, businesses crumbling and tension mounting while Buhari and the Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele appear to be in isolation or living in total denial.”
The group stressed that rather, both Buhari and Emefiele only made clumsy, scanty ambiguous statements through their spokespersons.
The group added: “At this point, it has become obvious that Buhari is using Emefiele in a sinister scheme to revisit on the nation, his harsh, ill-conceived, autocratic 1984 currency review that created untold mass suffering and widespread frustration and the death of several Nigerians.
“The insincerity in Buhari’s pronouncements is further confirmed by the fact that since they were made, investigation by the CNG across Northern Nigerian states have shown that since the deceptive directive was given, the Deposit Money Banks have not been reimbursed with neither the old nor the new notes.”
The group added that this explained why the banks resorted to issuing less than N5,000 to customers with legitimate need for their own money as against the Supreme Court order that no president or any officer in government has the right to deny citizens access to their own money.
The northern group stressed that sadly, Buhari was in the last lap of his tenure and had allegedly chosen the path of dishonor, dictatorship, aristocracy and was bound to leave behind a very bad legacy to the nation.
It suggested that state governors should meet with the president-elect and fashion out a way out in order to halt the current national drift toward greater conflict.
