Old Notes: Extend deadline to June - Senate tells CBN

The Senate has urged the Central Bank of Nigeria to urgently extend the withdrawal of old currency notes from circulation from January 31, to June 30, 2023.

The senate’s resolution was sequel to a point of order raised by Sen. Mohammed Ndume (APC-Borno) during the plenary on Wednesday.

The CBN had on October 26, announced plans to redesign the N200, N500, and N1,000 notes.

Raising Orders 41 and 51 of Senate Standing Rule, Ndume said that the call for extension of the date should be considered as a matter of urgent national importance in order to forestall imminent hardship for Nigerians.

Ndume said, “This senate notes that many Nigerian banks on Thursday, December 15, opened their vaults to customers and depositors to exchange their old currency for the newly redesigned currency which has a stipulated deadline of Jan. 31.

“Some Nigerians are already envisaging long queues in the banking hall across the country as a result of people trying to get access to the new naira note.

“The old notes are expected to be in circulation along the new ones until Jan. 31 when the old ones are expected to be phased out.

“It is expected that many Nigerian businesses will start to rejecting the old notes as soon as banks start paying redesigned notes to customers.”

The lawmaker also said that access to the new notes would be compounded by recent circular by the CBN which limited the amount of cash withdrawal by corporate entities.

He started, “The withdrawal of old notes from circulation, if not extended beyond January 31, will make many Nigerians to be thrown into hardship. We need to avoid the repeat of 1984 experience in terms of the withdrawal of old notes.”

Contributing, Sen. Adamu Aliero (PDP-Kebbi) said it was true rural dwellers were not aware of the currency redesign.

“So this motion is very apt and timely. If we insist on the date given by CBN, it will cause a lot of hardship for our rural dwellers. Majority of our people live in rural areas where there are no banks and PoS. It is appropriate we extend the time as suggested in the motion,”Aliero said.