The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Wednesday said the apex bank will redesign the country’s currency and will release the redesigned naira notes by December 15, 2022.

The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, made this known during a special press briefing in Abuja.

According to Emefiele, the reason for the action is aimed at controlling currency in circulation as well as curbing counterfeits and ransom payment to kidnappers and terrorists.

He said, “Indeed, the integrity of a local legal tender, the efficiency of its supply and its efficacy in the conduct of monetary policy are some of the hallmarks of a great central bank.

“In recent times, however, currency management has faced several daunting challenges that have continued to grow in scale and sophistication with attendant and unintended consequences for the integrity of both the CBN and the country.”

When speaking on how the action would put an end to ransom payment, Emefiele stated, “Also, in view of the prevailing level of security situation in the country, the CBN is convinced that the incident of terrorism and kidnapping will be minimised as access to large volume of money outside the banking used as source of funds for ransom payment will begin to dry up.”

He further highlighted more reasons that precipitated the re-designing of the naira notes.

The Governor identified challenges which included hoarding of banknotes by members of the public, shortage of clean and fit banknotes, increased ease and risk of counterfeiting evidenced by several security reports, among others.

In an effort to clear off the money being hoarded by Nigerians as soon as possible, he said that existing notes would seize to be regarded as legal tenders by January 31, 2023.

Emefiele, then, urged Nigerians to proceed to their banks to deposit their naira notes, saying that deposit fee would be waived for transactions below N150, 000.

He also directed all commercial banks to keep open their currency processing centres from Monday to Saturday so as to accommodate all cash that would be returned by their customers.

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