The Senate on Friday screened the two newly re-appointed deputy governors of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Aisha Ahmad and Edward Adamu.
The Red Chamber had on Wednesday at plenary commissioned the committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions to get clarifications from the apex bank chiefs when they appear for their re-appointment screening.
Reactions have continued to surround the policy of the CBN to limit cash withdrawal for individuals to N100,000 and corporate bodies N500, 000 per week.
The deputy governors however told the committee that it was high time the country embraced the policy.
According to Punch, it was observed that the senators simply asked for an explanation from the deputy governors without further probing on the details of the policy.
Ahmad, who is the apex bank’s deputy governor on Financial System Stability, explained that the policy was not new as it was introduced in 2012 during former President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, starting with Lagos State. She said its implementation was extended to Abuja and six more states in 2013.
Ahmad added, “Though full implementation of the policy has not been carried out by CBN since then, its introduction has brought a lot of transformation to the banking and payment systems.
“Based on information available to the CBN, the time for full implementation of the policy with the proposed limit on cash withdrawals per week is now. The required infrastructure for its implementation in terms of financial access point system, mobile money, E-naira, etc, are available across the 774 local government councils in the country.
“All the fears and worries being expressed by Nigerians about the planned limited cash withdrawal policy are seriously being taken care of as nobody or a section of Nigerians will be left out.”
She noted that in the past, transactions were limited to bank branches but has expanded to include multiple electronic platforms as well as a geometrical increase in the number of agents from 88,000 to 1.4 million.
She said the apex bank would be ready to accommodate opinions that wouldn’t make the policy strenuous to any category of Nigerians during implementation.
After her presentation, the committee, chaired by Senator Uba Sani (APC Kaduna Central), asked the nominees to “take a bow and go” as moved by the Whip of the Senate who doubles as the deputy chairman of the committee, Senator Orji Kalu (APC, Abia North) and seconded by Senator Danjuma Goje (APC,Gombe Central).
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