CBN Orders Banks To Collect Old N1000 And N500

Banks are now required by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to begin collecting old N500 and N1,000 notes from consumers.

The apex bank’s spokesman, Osita Nwanisobi, revealed this on Friday, saying that deposits of more than N500,000 were not permitted.

The news comes as Nigerians are furious over the rejection of currencies that President Muhammadu Buhari proclaimed to be worthless.

Buhari had requested that Nigerians take old N500 and N1000 notes to the CBN and other designated locations in his national broadcast, but commercial banks refused to accept them, forcing Nigerians to travel to the offices of the central bank.

The bank staff in Lagos struggled to keep the mob under control and tried to steer them toward commercial banks, but they were refused.

The CBN accepted that since the deadline for depositing the old naira notes had been moved to April 10, deposits under N500,000 could be made at commercial banks while deposits over N500,000 would be at CBN branches, according to a CBN employee from the Lagos office who spoke off-the-record.

CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele made a plea to Nigerians on Thursday to support the implementation of the naira redesign strategy.

He made this statement during an interview with State House Correspondents after meeting President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

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He claimed that the policy’s current drawbacks were only temporary and argued that it will strengthen the government’s fight against corruption and stimulate the economy.

He had said: “The truth is that we are all servants. We are serving Nigerians. As far as we are concerned the Attorney General has spoken on this matter and the President has sealed the whole issue this morning in his broadcast. I think I can only just appeal to Nigerians, let’s allow this policy to work.

“This policy is one policy that goes to reduce the problem of corruption and illicit financial flaws; this policy goes to resolve some of the problems in the economy; this policy also goes to reducing the level of insecurity in the country.

“So these three issues which are the tripod of this administration’s policy are all embedded in this policy. We should just allow it to work. We keep saying this, there are some temporary pains, but I can assure Nigerians that the long-run benefit to Nigeria is overwhelming and we should just give it a chance to work.”