Some leaders buying, storing new naira notes, no need for deadline extension – Emefiele

Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, says there is no need to change the February 10 deadline for the circulation of old naira notes.

He accused some powerful people of mopping up the new naira notes from banks and storing them up for whatever reasons.

Emefiele made the disclosure while briefing the diplomatic community at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Abuja on Tuesday.

According to him  the situation is “substantially calming down since the commencement of over-the-counter payments to complement ATM disbursements and the use of super-agents. There is, therefore, no need to consider any shift from the deadline of February 10.”

The clarification is coming on the heels of confusion over the supreme court order which extended the deadline to February 15, pending the hearing by the court.

Nigerians were thrown into confusion as commercial banks refused to take the old notes at their branches on Monday.

Speaking further, Emefiele said, “Some of our leaders are buying the new notes and storing them for whatever purpose and I will not expand further on that.”

Emefiele said the apex bank acknowledges the suffering of Nigerians, noting that effective implementation of the policy could scrap 4% of the inflation numbers.

He further explained that the optimal volume of cash in circulation should be around N700billion.

He said: “Even if we say N1trillion should be in circulation, we cannot refloat N3.7trillion into circulation.”