IMF Advises Emefiele On Naira Redesign Policy

<h4>IMF Advises Emefiele<&sol;h4>&NewLine;<p>OpenLife Nigeria reports that as the Supreme Court&comma; on Wednesday&comma; handed down a temporary halt to the implementation of the Central Bank of Nigeria&comma; CBN&&num;8217&semi;s February 10 deadline for depositing old notes in commercial banks across Nigeria&comma; the International Monetary Fund&comma; IMF&comma; has offered advice to the Godwin Emefiele led CBN management&period;<br &sol;>&NewLine;According to the IMF&comma; through a statement made available to OpenLife Wednesday afternoon&comma; IMF advised the Godwin Emefiele led CBN management to consider a review of it&&num;8217&semi;s earlier stand to the effect that old notes can no longer be deposited in commercial banks&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;In light of hardships caused by disruptions to trade and payments due to the shortage of new bank notes available to the public&comma; in spite of measures introduced by the CBN to mitigate the challenges in the banknote swap process&comma; the IMF encourages the CBN to consider extending the deadline&comma; should problems persist in the next few days leading up to the February 10&comma; 2023 deadline&comma;&&num;8221&semi; the Funds said&period;<br &sol;>&NewLine;Meanwhile&comma; the apex court on Wednesday ruled in favour of Kaduna&comma; Kogi and Zamfara states&comma; who&comma; in a suite against the federal government sought a restraining order to stop the full implementation of the naira redesign policy of the CBN&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The three states prayed the court to grant an interim injunction stopping the CBN from ending the timeframe within which the old N200&comma; N500&comma; and N1000 notes will cease to be legal tender&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The plaintiffs said since the announcement of the policy&comma; there has been an acute shortage in the supply of the new naira notes in their states&comma; adding that citizens who have dutifully deposited their old currency notes have increasingly found it difficult and sometimes next to impossible to access the new notes for their daily activities&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Asides from the unavailability of the new notes&comma; the plaintiffs also submitted that the notice period given by the federal government was inadequate&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>They submitted that the 10-day extension is insufficient to address the challenges plaguing the policy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The plaintiffs have also filed a motion on notice to abridge the time within which the respondent may file and serve a counter-affidavit for an accelerated<&sol;p>&NewLine;