IBADAN, Nigeria (VOICE OF NAIJA) – Nigerians have been reacting to the new currency management policy announced on Tuesday by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), limiting cash withdrawals by individuals and corporate bodies.
According to the CBN, from 9 January, individuals and companies will only be able to withdraw a maximum of N100,000 and N500, 000 cash respectively in a week across the counter.
The revised cash withdrawal limits also affect other payment channels; including Automated Teller Machine (ATM), Point of Sale (PoS) and cheque-based transaction.
It applies generally to all commercial banks and other cash-transaction banks such as payment service banks (PSBs), primary mortgage banks (PMB) and microfinance banks (MFBs).
The decision is coming after the CBN began the distribution of its newly redesigned bank notes.
The bank said redesigning the notes will help check inflation, counterfeiting and corruption.
In the new development, CBN directed that only N200 and lower denominations should be loaded into banks’ ATM machines.
“Further to the launch of the redesigned naira notes by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on Wednesday, 23 November, 2022, and in line with the cashless policy of the CBN, all deposit money banks and other financial institutions are hereby directed to note and comply with the following:
“The maximum cash withdrawal over the counter by individuals and corporate organisations per week shall henceforth be N100,000 and N500,000 respectively. Withdrawals above these limits shall attract processing fees of 5 percent and 10 percent, respectively.
“Third-party cheques above N50,000 shall not be eligible for payment over the counter, while extant limits of N10,000,000 on clearing cheques still subsist,” it read.
The bank also said the maximum cash withdrawal per week via ATM should be N100,000 subject to a maximum of N20,000 cash withdrawal per day.
Since the emergence of the report on Tuesday, “The CBN” has been trending on Twitter with many Nigerians dragging the apex bank for having a say over the amount of money they can withdraw per day/week.
Pan-Africanist, Shehu Sani said: “Cash withdrawals; the CBN can do anything it wants to do since the law says it only needs the approval of Mr President.The CBN is a Republic within a Republic.”
Investigative journalist, David Hundeyin said: “If the CBN actually believed that it could impose cashlessness on Nigeria, the policy would have simply banned cash withdrawals over a certain threshold, or made them subject to an application.
“Instead all it did was charge individuals 5% and corporates 10% to exceed the limit.
“It’s literally just another tax.
“I don’t understand how you people are not seeing it.
“It’s so obvious to my eyes.”
“The CBN hopes that making the naira scarce will increase it’s value .
“Again, we shall all learn economics together,” says @FinPlanKaluAja1 who is concerned about the outcome of such policy.
@GeneralOluchi wrote: “With the CBN cash withdrawal policy, those policemen that like taking people to the ATM or POS to withdraw money can only get up to 100k a week, but what if you’ve already withdrawn 100k, it means they get nothing. So you go chop beating?”
A tweep, @IA talkspace said: “So according to the CBN’s latest policy, individuals can’t withdraw more than ₦100k/week without a 5% penalty.
“But worse, your bank gets to decide whether or not your request to withdraw ₦100k+ is legitimate.
“It is your money, but you need your bank’s permission to access it.
“And according to the rules, if you desperately need to withdraw ₦150k emergency funds, you need to explain what you want to use the money for, present your ID card, and obtain an approval in writing from the bank’s CEO. 🙏🙏”
@AgentCIA4, however, is of the opinion that the CNN should be applauded for the policy because it would reduce crime in the country.
“Why would an individual need more than 100k cash? This policy will help to reduce a lot of crimes like ransom kidnapping and the rest. We should applaud CBN for this pls.”
@Reenu_Mo wrote: “Proper measures should also be put in place to help with the policies… what happens when you get to the market and you try to transfer and it’s not going.we all know how mobile banking get debited without getting your money. How do you pay local vendors?”
@SimplestJabir tweeted: “This move is good..1 Look at how it would reduce kidnapping, 2. It reduces Bribery. 3. It encourages Internet banking. 4. It reduces fraud. 5. It reduces production cost of Naira that would be damaged by Nigerians in no time. We shouldn’t be attacking these people always”
@GradObi who found @SimplestJabir’s comment hilarious said: “Lol.. Nigeria wants to use economic policies to curb internal insecurity. 😂😂 The way to curb kidnapping is to get the security forces to do their job efficiently. So if you’re kidnapped you will say, no money in circulation when you’re asked for ransom?”