Again, CBN Warns against Naira Mutilation

James Sowole in Akure

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has once more warned against mutilating the naira. It also warned that any person caught handling the nation’s currency badly would be jailed for five years or given an option of N50,000 fine.

The Assistant Director, Currency Operation Department of the CBN, Mr. Benedict Maduagwu, gave the warning in Akure, Ondo State, at the beginning of a sensitisation programme for the market men, women and youths.

Maduagwu, who was among the CBN officials that addressed the audience, said there was a need for citizens to develop a habit of properly handling the naira.

” Government uses tax payers’ money to print the naira notes so it is unfair for us to be rough-handling the notes. If you continue to spoil the naira notes, there will be no much money for the commercial banks to give out as loans to you customers and this will affect our economy. Do not squeeze the naira notes, do not write on the notes, naira notes put under the clothes because of bacterial infection to the body. Anybody selling naira notes is an enemy of Nigeria”, he said.

The CBN officer said the scarcity of smaller denomination of naira in the circulation would soon be addressed.

He said the CBN boss would soon come to the state to sell smaller denomination naira notes directly to the market men and women, adding that the exercise would be carried out periodically.

“We want to appeal to the commercial banks to be putting smaller denomination inside their ATMs in order to end the scarcity of smaller denomination in the country,” Maduagwu said.