There was confusion and panic online on Thursday as the House of Representatives erroneously declared that the deadline for old naira notes to cease being legal tender was December 31, 2024.
However, this contradicted the judgment of the Supreme Court and the position of the Central Bank of Nigeria.
During a meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee in October 2022, a former CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele said the increase in inflationary pressure was being fuelled by the prevalence of N1,000 and N500 bills in circulation.
Emefiele, who has since been removed from his position, stated in October 2022 that the banknotes of N200, N500, and N1,000 would be redesigned.
He also announced the introduction of new notes, giving a deadline for old N200, N500 and N1,000 notes.
The deadline for using the old notes as legal tender was January 31, 2023, but it was extended to February 10.
In February 2023, a suit was initiated by some states, including Kaduna, Kogi, and Zamfara, challenging the implementation of the policy.
Five days later, the Supreme Court restrained the CBN from giving effect to the deadline following an ex parte application brought by the three states.
On November 29, 2023, the Supreme Court ruled that old and new naira notes would co-exist as legal tender until further notice.
However, moving the motion titled: ‘Need for the CBN to sensitize Nigerians About the Non-legal Tender Status of Old Naira Notes from January 1 2025’, a member of the Labour Party, representing Ogbaru Federal Constituency, Anambra State at the House of Representatives, Victor Afam Ogene, claimed that by the apex court’s judgment, the old naira notes “shall cease to be legal tender, medium of exchange for goods and services in Nigeria, and shall also cease to be in circulation as from January 1, 2025”.
In response, the CBN clarified that the old series of N200, N500, and N1,000 banknotes will remain valid indefinitely, refuting claims that the notes would cease to be legal tender by December 31, 2024.
In a statement released on Thursday by the acting Director of Corporate Communications, Sidi Hakama, the CBN emphasised that such reports are false and intended to disrupt the nation’s payment system.
The CBN reaffirmed its commitment to ensuring that all Nigerian banknotes, including both the old and redesigned series, remain in circulation.
Reacting to the statement from the CBN, Ogene, who is also the leader of the Labour Party caucus in the house, said despite the unintended factual error in the motion asking the Central Bank of Nigeria to take action concerning the concurrent validity of old and the redesigned naira notes two years after the controversial policy was introduced, the CBN’s lack of decisiveness on the policy remains embarrassing.
He also maintained that while the mix-up or omission of the Supreme Court’s subsisting pronouncement on the validity of both versions of naira notes is acknowledged, the House’s intervention, following his motion on the subject matter, was not conclusive, the essence of which the House resolution directed its Committee on Banking Regulations to interface with the apex bank and report back in 21 days.
Ogene made these assertions in a statement on Friday following the clarification by the CBN that the latest Supreme Court pronouncement reversed its earlier ruling by not stating a definite date that the old N200, N500 and N1000 naira notes would cease to be valid legal tender.
He queried further in his statement, “But even with the latest development, some issues remain germane: which country in the world runs its economy with two different sets of unidentical currency notes?
“What was the intention of the CBN in introducing new sets of notes; was it not with an aim at eventually replacing the old sets?
“Now that the ‘politics’ that heralded the introduction of the new notes are long over, shall the country and its people continue to suffer the afflictions arising therefrom? For instance, it is common knowledge that some people still mistake the new N200 note for the old N10 bill. Yet, both continue to co-exist.
“Besides the issue of deadlines, who in Nigeria is not embarrassed by the stinking, dilapidated nature of currencies emanating from the vaults of our country’s commercial banks, while the CBN continues to look on, as if it is the new normal.
“Daily, citizens lose as much as between N5,000 to N10,000 for every N100,000 cashed in various banking halls, due to mutilated and torn notes.
“The CBN, as the country’s apex bank and regulator of the sector, cannot hide under the legalese of ‘deadline ad infinitum’ to shrink its responsibilities to the banking public.”