A FORMER senator representing Kaduna central, Shehu Sani, has said President Muhammadu Buhari has limited knowledge of economics to implement the naira policy.
Speaking on Tuesday, February 14 on Arise TV, Sani said the naira redesign policy of the Buhari administration had brought more suffering and hardship to Nigerians.
He said that the policy lacked consultation with the legislative arm and various developmental civil society groups.
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The senator said, “What is wrong in this policy is that there should have been wide consultation. It’s not simply about the CBN governor going to the president to get his approval over an issue that I believe that the president of the country has limited knowledge of, because he is not an economist.
“I expected that before such a decision was made, there would have been wide consultation with the national assembly and also the civil societies. By doing that, you are carrying the whole country along and then ideas will be crystalised and problems that may arise will be predicted and they can be solved.
“All we have known was that the governor of the central bank has made it very clear that all he needed was the approval of Mr President, and he got that, and now everyone is paying the price.”
Sani expressed displeasure with difficulties he said Nigerians are experiencing in their adoption of a cashless system and internet banking that the CBN is insisting on.
He said, “They will tell you today cash is not available. But if you have to use the cashless system, sometimes the alert doesn’t come in time and as such, the whole transaction in the country has become a problem.”
He said the policy has forced border communities to start using foreign currencies in trade, commerce and investment.
He said, “Even our communities in the border areas are now using currencies like the cefa from other countries. As we have heard, people in rural areas have resorted to trade by barter. So, we have gotten ourselves into an economic turbulence that is man-made but could have been avoided.
“How can people that have paraded themselves as experienced in managing finance, banks, and whatever get us into this kind of situation?”
Sani, however, believed that the policy would reduce the incidence of vote-buying in the forthcoming general elections.
“Well, to be fair, if this redesigning of the naira and the cashless policy is about combating or containing vote-buying, that is a very good initiative. But the fallout or the consequences of it on the other side is that people are suffering, and you don’t know which of the notes to accept,” he said.
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