Mr. Godwin Emefiele, the central bank governor, has urged commercial banks to go to apex bank locations nationwide to pick up the new naira notes or risk punishment.
The CBN governor announced this on Wednesday, 18th January 2023, at Computer Village, Ikeja in Lagos, during the sensitization tour of the newly designed naira notes.
The new naira designs were ready and awaiting pickup by commercial banks so they could be distributed throughout Nigeria, Mr. Emefiele said through a spokesperson, Mr. Kofo Salam-Alada, the director of the CBN’s legal services division.
He said this:
“We have been calling upon the banks to approach the Central Bank of Nigeria across the country to come and pick up the new notes; we have even waived some of the conditionality for accessing currency notes to accommodate the banks.
The banks were being given slots before, but now the Central Bank of Nigeria is bending over backwards to accommodate the demands of the banks to service them so that they can service you and so that everybody will have access to the new naira notes.
Part of what we are doing is that we have monitors going around the banks now. I have been to some ATMs this morning and I’ve lodged a report and I’ve spoken to the management of the various banks.”
The CBN governor said they are working hard to ensure the new naira design circulates in Nigeria.
There should be no banks that should not be given the new naira notes from the ATMs, and all ATMs should load the new naira notes.
As we are giving the old notes, we should be able to take back the new ones, enabling people to transact their day-to-day business. If the machines are not dispensing the new notes, then it will not circulate,” he added.
Additionally, he assured the marketers that the issues they were experiencing would be resolved quickly.
If customers have trouble obtaining the new notes, Mr Emefiele gave them phone numbers to call—08176657641, 08176657642, 08176656721, and 07080650791—as well as instructions to text—newnaira@cbn.gov.ng.
Timmy David, the president of the Coalition of Associations in Computer Village, pleaded with the CBN to uphold their commitment by ensuring that the replacement notes were available before the deadline.
The CBN governor additionally washed a fresh N1000 note to ease societal concerns regarding the validity of the new notes.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Chief Lateef Oluseyi, the Olukosi of Ikeja Land, greeted Emefiele and his team when they paid a visit to the palace of the Olu of Ikeja Land. Mr Emefiele informed the chief about redesigning the N1000, N500, and N200 denominations.
Any bank that refuses to pick up the fresh notes and deposit cash into their ATMs would face sanctions, according to the CBN.
The CBN will stick with its decision to make 31st January 2023 the deadline for the old notes following its sensitization trip.
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