CBN officials find hidden N6m new naira notes in Sterling Bank branch

A Central Bank of Nigeria monitoring team has uncovered bundles of new notes at a Sterling Bank branch at Bank Road, Ado Ekiti, Ekiti State.

A viral video showing the bundles at the Sterling Bank branch surfaced online on Sunday.

It was said that the officials of the bank refused to dispense the money through its five Automated Teller Machines for about two weeks in a violation of the directive of the CBN.

A voice in the video who identified himself as a Deputy Director of the CBN, Mr Oluwole Owoeye, said the bank officials claimed that the ATMs were yet to be configured.

The CBN official accused the bank of deliberately hoarding the new naira notes after receiving for two weeks without dispensing it to the public.

He said, “I’m currently at Sterling Bank,  Bank Road, Ado-Ekiti; as part of this monitoring compliance with the guidelines by CBN. They have N6m, which they collected from Central Bank of Nigeria for about two weeks but never disbursed any.

“They said they are yet to configure the ATM. I don’t know why that is so. I brought their attention to the penalty clause of N1m per day because they have five ATMs.  So, they don’t have any reason for keeping this money.

“The Zonal Service Manager, Kunle Onipede, promised that latest 10am tomorrow (Monday), because I promised them that I will be here by 10am and I want to see the machine dispensing this money.”