The Central Bank of Nigeria has stated that the cash withdrawal limit is not anti-people.
According to The PUNCH, this was stated by the Deputy Governor, Financial System Stability, CBN, Aisha Ahmad, on Thursday, while appearing before the House of Representatives.
Ahmad represented the CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, who had twice failed to appear before the lawmakers to defend the policy which had generated a groundswell of opposition from Nigerians.
The CBN’s deputy governor reassured lawmakers that despite concerns about the paucity of commercial bank branches, especially in rural regions, statistics obtained by the CBN revealed that consumers in such areas had embraced internet banking options.
In addition, Ahmad stated that the CBN had placed an order with the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc for 500 million newly designed N200, N500, and N1,000 notes.
Ahmad dispelled rumors by explaining that the policy will not affect the N100, N50, N10, and N5 notes that are often used in the countryside and the hinterlands.
“Finally, we just want to reiterate the overall benefits of the cashless policy. It is to reduce cash processing costs, minting costs, the cost of destroying old notes and the cost of moving the physical cash from place to place; the cost of protecting it. All these costs are passed on typically to the banking public. Getting rid of these costs means that charges will be less in that respect.
“Also, this is an opportunity to promote Nigeria’s positive image from a money laundering perspective. Even the recently passed anti-money laundering law has limits for cash for a reason because cash is usually the medium by which some of these nefarious activities are done. Suffice it to say that the advantages around protecting people from armed robbery, kidnapping, and terrorism financing go without gainsaying.” she stated.
