According to a source, President Muhammadu Buhari is the brain behind the Central Bank of Nigeria’s naira restructuring program (CBN).
According to the report, President Buhari asked the top bank’s Governor Godwin Emefiele to execute the policy to combat vote buying ahead of the 2023 general elections.
According to news reports, Buhari introduced the redesigned naira note on November 23, 2022, consisting of N200, N500, and N1,000 bank notes, with a January 31st deadline to exchange existing notes for new ones.
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However, following widespread public and political outrage, the President extended the deadline to February 10th.
The delay, however, has not been successful, as many Nigerians are still scurrying to obtain the fresh notes as the deadline approaches.
Although governors elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) met with President Buhari and demanded that the new and old notes be used concurrently until the end of the year, Buhari rejected the governors’ demand and urged Nigerians to give him a seven-day grace period to resolve the naira scarcity.
Unsatisfied with Buhari’s response, three APC governors — Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna, Yahaya Bello of Kogi, and Bello Mutawalle of Zamfara – petitioned the Supreme Court to halt the deadline for exchanging old notes.
Top government officials with knowledge of the policy, however, told The Whistler on Monday that President Buhari would not back down on the policy since it is part of his agenda to ensure that the 2023 election is free, fair, and legitimate without politicians buying voters with money.
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According to the source, Buhari believes that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) will ensure that votes are counted, and that politicians who have mastered the art of bullying constituents will be denied their wishes.
The source said, “This new naira note is actually the president’s idea, and he is the one that authorized it and not Emefiele, and he believes that it is one thing that will help stop vote buying.
“The President believes that with this BVAS, votes will count and that politicians have perfected the act of intimidating constituents. Recall that he had said that no politician would be allowed to mobilise resources to intimidate constituents.
“The President believes that politicians have perfected the act of mobilizing cash to intimidate constituents through vote buying during the elections and that they have stockpiled many cash waiting to deploy it to different constituencies.
“So, this is the president’s idea completely. Most of these notable politicians have identified where these cash are being stockpiled, and that was why over two months grace period was given to people to go and return money.
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“Those who earned money legitimately have been returning the money to the banks, and there is no bank that have ever refused to accept any of the old banknotes.
“But those who got the money illegitimately refused because they believe they could put pressure on the federal government and the central bank to rescind this decision, and it has not worked.”
While claiming that corrupt politicians are behind protests and publications against the scheme, the insider claims that their antics would fail because Buhari is dedicated to seeing the project through to completion.
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