Nasir El-Rufai, Governor of Kaduna State, has revealed that what President Muhammadu Buhari approved differed from what the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) did in terms of currency redesigning and swapping.
The Governor, who has vehemently opposed the Buhari administration’s new monetary policy, attempted to explain himself in a statement titled ‘Nigeria Update: ABC of Currency Redesign vs. XYZ of Cash Confiscation Explained,’ which he shared on Twitter on Sunday night.
The Governor claimed that while the President approved the redesign of the N200, N500, and N1000 notes, the CBN only recolored them.
“Currency redesign was approved by the President and announced. Currency recolouring resulted,” El-Rufai said.
He also claimed that the President approved currency swap, which means that Nigerians should deposit their old notes in banks and receive equivalents in exchange, while the CBN engaged in Naira confistication instead.
“Currency swap was envisaged by s.20(3) of the Central Bank of Nigeria Act as approved by PMB. Swap means I take N100,000 to the bank in old notes & I receive N100,000 immediately in new notes. No more, no less,” he said.
The Governor claimed that the central bank only printed N400 billion and withdrew over N2 trillion from the system during the cash swap, accusing the bank of illegally confiscating naira notes, a decision that he claimed caused trade and exchange collapse in the country, as well as suffering, impoverishment, and economic contraction.
“The policy objective was derailed into a deliberate national fiasco to sabotage the elections in the name of preventing vote-buying.
All efforts to get CBN to implement what was lawfully approved failed.
“Some State Governments had no choice but to approach the Supreme Court for adjudication,” he said.