CBN reacts to report on ‘plans’ to convert $30bn in domiciliary accounts to naira

 

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Saturday described as untrue a story by a national daily which said the apex bank was planning to convert $30bn domiciliary deposits in the country to naira.

Abujapress reports that the Nigerian currency, naira, has been experiencing free-fall, defying several policies put in place by CBN to save it from further plunge.

A popular newspaper, PUNCH, had reported on Saturday that the apex bank was mulling a policy that will result in the conversion of foreign currencies in domiciliary accounts of citizens to naira to stabilise the national currency, which earlier this week recorded its worst performance in history.

The report sparked several reactions, with some Nigerians describing it as a very wrong move.

“If you seize all the dollars in domiciliary accounts – then next time around, people will simply reduce their dollar exposure to the Nigerian banking system,” a popular public policy analyst, Onye Nkuzi, said in a post on X handle.

But reacting to the report in a post on its verified X handle on Saturday morning, the CBN, which appear to be in a confused state on how best to stabilise the naira, said there was nothing like that.

It said : “No plans to convert $30bn domiciliary deposits to naira. This news is fake!”