Breaking: VP Osinbajo Sends Message To CBN Over New Naira Notes Scarcity

Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo has advised the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to quickly address the new naira notes scarcity in the country.

Osinbajo stated this in a meeting with some Financial Technology Companies (FinTechs) stakeholders on Friday in Abuja.

He asked the apex bank to employ the services of fintech companies and mobile money agents to address the difficulty in getting new naira notes as well as sought possible ways to mitigate the hardship.

Osinbajo advised the CBN and commercial banks to work with all fintechs firms that have mobile money agents, in order to reach the farthest places in the country.

Osinbajo lamented the scarcity of the new notes and urged regulators and the banks to deploy more fintech and money agents to the hinterlands to address the worrying situation.

He said: “More disturbing is the fact that after depositing your old notes, there are no new notes, so people everywhere in the urban areas and rural areas simply have no money.

“There are logistical challenges that have to be addressed by the CBN and the banks, especially from the point of view of the average Nigerian and those in the hinterland who hardly use any electronic platforms.”

Osinbajo also said while there has always been a certain failure rate in online banking and money transactions, they have become even more difficult now with the increase in the number of transactions congesting the system.

He said, “So where in the past you used POS or any of the electronic platforms, you had maybe 20 percent to 30 percent failure rate, now because everyone is trying to get on those platforms, obviously, the failure rate is much more and the problems are much more pronounced.”

Osinbajo, who also agreed with President Muhammadu Buhari on ensuring that stability is restored, assured the nation that the challenges are being addressed and would be solved very soon.

“We really need to make progress even as we make efforts to deal with some of these issues confronting us today,” he added.