THE NEW NAIRA NOTES
Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered a suspension of the deadline for the swapping of old to new Naira notes by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The Supreme Court issued an interim injunction restraining the Federal Government from suspending the acceptance of the old Naira notes on the Friday February 10, 2023 deadline.
Kaduna, Zamfara, and Kogi State on Monday instituted a suit against the Federal Government at the Supreme Court over the scarcity of old and new Naira notes due to the CBN naira redesign policy.
The state governments said they are worried about the effects the CBN naira redesign policy is having on the residents of their states.
Consequently, they are seeking a restraining order by the Supreme Court to compel the government and CBN from implementing the policy.
The states filed an ex-parte motion through their lawyer, AbdulHakeem Uthman Mustapha (SAN), and are urging the Supreme Court to grant them an interim injunction stopping the Federal Government either by itself or acting through the CBN, the commercial banks or its agents from carrying out its plan of ending the timeframe within which the now older versions of the 200, 500 and 1000 denominations of the Naira may no longer be legal tender on February 10, 2023.
“Unless this Honourable Court intervenes, the Government and people of Kaduna, Kogi and Zamfara State will continue to go through a lot of hardship and would ultimately suffer great loss as a result of the insufficient and unreasonable time within which the Federal Government is embarking on the ongoing currency redesign policy,” Mustapha said.
The states said there has been a shortage in the supply of the new naira notes in Kaduna, Kogi and Zamfara States and that citizens who have dutifully deposited their old naira notes have increasingly found it difficult and sometimes next to impossible to access new naira notes to go about their daily activities.
The states said the CBN policy is imposing a lot of hardship on Nigerians and insisted that the ten-day extension by the Federal Government is still insufficient to address the challenges of Nigerians swapping their old Naira notes for new ones.
This is as a High Court of the Federal Capital Territory restrained the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), CBN, its Governor Godwin Emefiele and 27 commercial banks from suspending, stopping, extending or interfering with the currency swap terminal date.
The order was handed down on Monday by Justice E. Enenche following an application by four political parties.
That said, the three governors, who dragged the CBN and the Federal Government to the Supreme Court, were seeking a halt to the full implementation of the naira redesign policy initiated by the apex bank.
But, moving the application on Wednesday, counsel to the applicants, Mr A. I. Mustapha, SAN, urged the court to grant the application in the interest of justice and Nigerians.
He argued that the policy had led to an “excruciating situation that is almost leading to anarchy in the land”.
After careful consideration of the motion exparte in the application, Justice Okoro granted the prayer.
Ruling on the motion, Justice Okoro held that “An order of Interim Injunction restraining the federal government through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) or the commercial banks from suspending or determining or ending on February 10, 2023, the time frame with which the now older version of the 200, 500 and 1,000 denomination of the naira may no longer be legal tender pending the hearing and determination of their motion on notice for an interlocutory injunction”.
The case has been adjourned to Wednesday, February 15, 2023
Comments
Post a Comment