The Central Bank of Nigeria has said there is an adequate circulation of the new naira notes in the economy.
The CBN Lagos Branch Controller, Godfrey Koyor, said this during a stakeholder sensitisation event on the currency redesign at the Balogun market in Lagos on Tuesday.
He also confirmed the intent of the CBN to maintain the January 31 deadline to phase out the old naira notes.
He said, “We are giving everyone the assurance that the new naira notes are available and available to everyone. We are distributing through the banking system. And as the transaction takes place, you are going to be having the new ones.
“So as people are giving out the old notes, they will be receiving the new notes. We have pushed a lot of the new redesigned currency notes into circulation and it is going round.”
He added, “I am assuring you that if you go to the ATM, you will get the new notes. The essence of giving the directive that the new naira notes should be dispensed through the ATM is so that they will be available to people during working hours and off working hours.
“So, whether it is banking hours or outside the banking hours, if you go to your ATM, you will get the new naira notes. It is a directive that the apex bank has given to all deposit money banks to make the money available in the machines so that people can have access to it, and we are supplying them with the new notes and they are making it available to the machines.”
He said it was an order coming from the apex bank that all ATM machines henceforth should be loaded only with the new notes.
Koyor added, “And so we expect compliance from the banks. And we believe that they are complying because they know the implication of non-compliance.
“There are implications for non-compliance from the bank, the Central Bank, we have supplied the banks and we have given them a directive to make the notes available to the customer through the payment channels, which is the ATM.”
Speaking on calls for an extension of the deadline, he said “Right now, the deadline is 31st of January and it is not changing. We haven’t changed the deadline. As I speak with you, the deadline remains sacrosanct and what we are asking the public and the banks to do to surrender the old notes and take new ones.
“We have new notes enough in supply we have enough. Give us the old notes you have your possession, give it out, deposit it to your bank, let your bank bring it to us and collect new notes.”
