{OPINION} Naira Swap: What the CBN should do

By Kehinde Aderemi

President Muhammadu Buhari’s last national broadcast on the state of the nation occasioned by the new naira swap policy was supposed to bring succour to the mass of the people.

Unfortunately, the speech was short of the soothing words that could relieve the pains being experienced by Nigerians at this critical time.

Buhari’s speech was not convincing enough as it truly lost touch with the reality of the present situation in the country.

For the past two weeks, the naira swap policy has created artificial scarcity of the naira which has also affected the entire country.

The new policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria to redesign the old naira notes came with a lot of pain.

And the CBN was adamant, saying there was no going back on the deadline for the swapping of naira notes.

There had been serious controversy over the deadline, with some state governors dragging the Federal Government to the Supreme Court, but the CBN maintained that the deadline was sacrosanct.

In Nigeria today, each day brings in its wake, different stories about how it has been difficult for Nigerians to live and survive in this country.

When banks across the country refused to collect the old naira notes, the Point of Sales (POS) operators started making a lot of money selling new naira notes at very exorbitant rates.

Banks are being shut down for fear of attacks. POS operators have become the Lord of Cash Exchange.

None of us owns a bank, we are not shareholders in any of the banks.

So, it is evident that the scarcity of the naira was a grand conspiracy against Nigeria and Nigerians.

There had been pockets of crisis and protests in Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Oyo and Edo states among others.

The protests are not only bad signal of a confused CBN governor that  had failed to understand the import of implementing a policy that is at variance with the  reality of the present situation in the country, it is also a reflection of a leadership failure which has always been the bane of Nigeria since independence in 1960.

At the outset, the cashless policy was meant to save the ailing economy and recover it from impending collapse.

Rather than becoming a blessing, the naira swap has turned out to be a curse as Nigerians go through hardship to get out of this difficult moment.

I am not an economist, however, analysing Buhari’s speech, I think the timing and the implementation of the naira swap policy was more political than it was meant to save the ailing economy.

Given the present situation in the country and the extent of pains experienced by Nigerians, I am appealing to the CBN governor to make more new naira notes available in circulation as this is the best way to address the plights of Nigerians over the cash scarcity.

Kehinde Aderemi writes from Lagos