Reps to summon bank CEOs on scarcity of new Naira notes
The House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to invite Deposit Money Banks, also known as commercial banks, on Wednesday due to a paucity of new naira notes.
The Managing Directors/Chief Executive Officers of the banks will meet with an ad hoc House committee led by the Majority Leader, Alhassan Ado-Doguwa, under the aegis of the Bankers’ Committee.
The House voted in plenary on Tuesday that the banks be invited to explain the purported supply shortage from the Central Bank of Nigeria, after which the lawmakers would interrogate the central bank’s leadership.
The House also agreed to extend the period for exchanging old notes for new ones by six months.
At the start of the session, a motion of urgent public concern moved by Sara Soli, a member of the House from Katsina State, was unanimously adopted.
Despite the fact that Nigerians have limited access to the new N1,000, N500, and N200 notes, the CBN is pushing on the January 31 validity date, according to Soli.
The PUNCH reported on Monday that banks’ Automated Teller Machines in Lagos, Abuja, and other regions of the country were still distributing the old notes eight days before the January 31 deadline.
Despite claims from the CBN and depositing banks that Nigerians will begin to get the new naira notes from ATMs across several platforms on Sunday, investigations showed that many ATMs belonging to financial institutions were still dispensing the old notes.
The House summoned CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele in December over the apex bank’s latest policy, which included curbs on cash withdrawals from banks and other financial institutions.
Following Emefiele’s failure to attend before the House on two occasions, MPs interrogated Aisha Ahmad, Deputy Governor, Financial System Stability, Central Bank of Nigeria, who led the Committee of Governors before the parliamentarians.
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