.. Emefiele to Personally Monitor Compliance
The Central Bank of Nigeria has directed banks to open to customers through weekends, that is, both on Saturdays and Sundays for the time being, as part of the apex bank’s strategy to finally put an end to the cash scarcity that has lingered for so long and made life miserable for Nigerians.
This was disclosed by the CBN’s Acting Director , Corporate Communications, Dr. Isa AbdulMumin, on Friday (today), adding that the Governor of the bank will be physically involved in monitoring compliance.
“Branches of commercial banks will operate on Saturdays and Sundays to attend to customers’ cash needs”, he said.
Meanwhile the bank spokesman confirmed that the Central Bank had evacuated banknotes from it’s vaults to commercial banks across the country as part of a coordinated effort to ease the circulation of banknotes of various denominations.
Dr. AbdulMumin further stated that a substantial amount of money, in various denominations, had been received by the commercial banks for onward circulation to their respective customers.
According to him, the CBN had directed all banks to load their Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) as well as conduct physical operations in the banking halls through the weekends.
He, therefore, urged Nigerians to be patient as the current situation would ease soon with the injection of more banknotes into circulation.
With this effort, the bank may be able to stave off the planned picketing of its offices nationwide by workers scheduled to begin on Monday.