The Central Bank of Nigeria has begun moves aimed at ensuring that banks in the country keep to the January 31 deadline for the circulation of old notes throughout the country.
In keeping with the directives, the apex bank branch in Akwa Ibom State, on Thursday dispatched a team of its personnel to various commercial banks in the Uyo metropolis to monitor compliance across the state.
Our correspondent who monitored the exercise reports that while two of the CBN teams visited various banking locations in different streets in the state, the third team visited some markets to sensitise market women on the CBN policies.
The banks visited include the First Bank of Nigeria, Zenith Bank, Access Bank, Fidelity Bank, Guaranty Trust Bank, United Bank for Africa, and Union Bank of Nigeria, all located at banking layout, Udo Udoma avenue.
Others visited include Unity Bank, Access Bank, the FBN, Ecobank and Wema Bank all located on the Aka Road, Uyo, the state capital.
Another group visited Sterling Bank, Zenith Bank, the FBN, the UBN, the UBA, Globus Bank, SUNTRUST bank, Keystone Bank, Access Bank, Polaris Bank, the GTB, First City Monument Bank, and Fidelity Bank, all on Abak road.
Our correspondent reports that while most of the banks visited had started complying with the new directives, a few others had yet to fully comply as some customers were complaining of lack of cash.
A customer with one of the banks at the Banking layout, Udo Udoma Avenue, who identified himself as Eyo Ekerendu, a retiree, expressed dissatisfaction over the delay (in withdrawing new naira notes), adding that he had been around since morning but could not withdraw through the Automated Teller Machine.
“I have been around since morning but I can’t withdraw because they are telling us that there is no cash,” he said, calling on the officials of the CBN to address the issues.
However, most of the banks were dispensing the new banks notes at their ATM points, apart from a few branches of the Zenith Bank and Sterling Bank, especially those inside the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital, which were observed to still be dispensing the old notes both from over-the-counter and the ATM points.
It was observed that the ATMs of Keystone Bank and First Bank were not dispensing, but customers were being paid from their counter.
Some of the banks even identified the shortage of the new notes as reason they did not load cash in some of their ATM points.
Meanwhile, the CBN has been commended for the ongoing enlightenment campaign for Nigerians to embrace the new currency redesign policy.
The commendations were made when officials of the CBN, Akwa Ibom State branch, took the sensitisation to the new naira notes to Itam park and Itam market all within the Uyo metropolis.
The CBN officials, led by the Deputy Director, Abuja office, Mr Ekanem Akpan, and Assistant Director, Head Banking, Uyo branch, Mr Isang Agbomi, had visited the park and the market with thousands of flyers for the sensitisation exercise.
Some of the people who reacted said they were happy to see officials of the CBN coming to the park and the market to educate the people on the development in the new monetary policy in the country.
A driver, Mr Emmanuel Udoh, said the people did not have power to reject the redesign naira notes since it was government directive and policy, but he regretted that members of the public might not be able to meet the January 31, 2023 deadline and, therefore, called for extension to the month of March.
A trader at the Itam market, Rose Michael, who said since the introduction of the new currencies she had not seen how they looked, tasked the management of the CBN to make “commercial banks and other monetary outlets to stop dispensing the old naira notes to customers for easy penetration of the new notes in the society.”
