Peter Dada, Akure
The Central Bank of Nigeria on Tuesday began a sensitization programme for market men and women as well as youths in Ondo State on how to properly operate with commercial banks without any hitch.
The apex bank specifically warned the traders against poor handling of naira notes, saying the law guiding the notes was still subsisting and violation of the laws would attract jail terms.
Addressing the gathering of bank customers, mostly market women in Akure, the Assistant Director, Currency Operation Department, CBN, Mr. Benedict Maduagwu, said there was a need for the citizens to develop a good habit of naira note handling.
Maduagwu, who was among the CBN officials who educated the bank customers and traders in attendance, reiterated that anybody caught mishandling naira notes would be jailed for five years with an option of N50,000 fine.
He said, “Government uses taxpayers’ money to print the naira notes; so, it is unfair for us to be handling poorly 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 your customers and this will affect our economy.
“Do not squeeze the naira notes, do not write on the notes and do not put the notes under clothes because of bacterial infection to the body.”
On the scarcity of smaller denomination notes in circulation, the CBN assistant director stated that the apex bank 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 put smaller denomination naira notes inside their ATMs in order to end the scarcity of smaller denomination notes in the country,” Maduagwu said.
In his remarks, the officer in charge of Consumer Protection Department of the CBN, Mr. Oludamola Atanda, urged the customers to lodge complaints and seek redress at their banks if there was an infraction or infringement on their personal bank accounts, especially cases of excessive charges.
