Emefiele orders banks to accept N500, N1000 notes
…as protesters besiege CBN in Lagos
By Enoch Oluku
As Lagosian took over the CBN premises in Lagos in a scramble to deposit their old naira notes, resulting in serious security breaches with thousands taking over the apex bank offices in Lagos, the Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele, in another fit of policy summersault has on Friday, directed Commercial Bank to start accepting deposits of the old naira notes of N500 and N1,000 denominations.
President Muhammadu Buhari had on Thursday, in a nationwide broadcast, approved only the N200 notes for recirculation, leaving out the N500 and N1,000, a situation that fueled grave discontent amongst Nigerians, just as the Governor of Kaduna, Kano, Lagos and Jigawa states had warned against banks rejecting the old naira notes in those states less they faced grave consequences.
By Thursday evening, the CBN boss had directed the CBN to accept the old naira notes with stringent procedures that prompted nationwide rage over the insensitivity of the authority to the plight of the people.
On Friday morning, most CBN offices were besieged by people who desired to make deposit of their old currency even with no hope of getting the redesigned notes in sight.
However, following the deluge of customers in most CBN offices particularly in southern Nigeria, resulting in possibility of grave security breaches, the CBN Governor, on Friday afternoon, directed Commercial banks to accept a maximum of N500,000.00 deposit from customers while those with more than that amount must visit any CBN branches to make their deposit.
The development has brought some calm into the situation as many traders were seen accepting the old notes for business transaction pending when it would be convenient for them to go to the banks to make deposits.
Meanwhile Governor El-Rufai of Kaduna state had directed the people of the state to continue to trade with the old currency of any denomination as valid legal tender in line with the Supreme Court directive even though Mr President had directed against further use of the old notes in the markets.
El-Rufai hinged his position on the Supreme Court ruling and the need to save the people from the pains of the naira crunch which was fueling grave discontent nationwide.
The governor and some other APC governors had challenged the Presidency and CBN on the haste in implementation of the naira redesign while the two PDP governors throw their weights behind the CBN for more pains on the masses.
The development had painted the PDP as enemy of the people, a party that was insensitive to the plight of ordinary Nigerians while the APC governors were battling to savage the situation from an insensitive presidency.
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