THE Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning in Nigeria, Zainab Ahmed, has come out to disapprove with the plans made by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), to redesign some denominations of the Nigerian currency, Naira.
It will be recalled that on Wednesday, CBN had announced through the governor of CBN, Godwin Emefiele, that it will start giving out the new resigned N100, N200, N500 and N1000 Naira notes, respectively from 15th December,2022.
Godwin Emefiele noted that that the reason for redesigning Naira was to stop the citizens from hoarding Naira and to curtail the financing of terrorism.
However, the Finance Minister, Zainab Ahmed has disclosed that the Ministry of Finance was not briefed or consulted when the plans were made by the CBN.
She also stressed that redesigning the Nigerian currency can led to economic consequences and may even affect the value of Naira to other foreign currencies.
The Finance Minister said this while replying the questions presented by the members of the Senate Committee on Finance at the 2023 budget defence session.
In her words: “Distinguished senators, we were not consulted at the Ministry of Finance by CBN on the planned naira redesigning and cannot comment on it as regards merits or otherwise.
“However as a Nigerian privileged to be at the top of Nigeria’s fiscal management, the policy, as rolled out at this time, portends serious consequences on value of naira to other foreign currencies.
“I will, however, appeal to this committee to invite the CBN governor for required explanations as regards merits of the planned policy and rightness or otherwise of its implementation now,” she said.
