Cardoso pledges to tackle unauthorised withdrawals, policy saboteurs

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has pledged to deal decisively with any bank found sabotaging monetary policies or guilty of unauthorised withdrawals from customer accounts.

The Governor of the apex bank, Mr Olayemi Cardoso made the pledge on Tuesday while briefing members of the House of Representatives in Abuja.

According to him, some departments in the CBN are being strengthened to carry out greater surveillance and over sight.

He said that alleged indiscriminate charges and withdrawals from customers accounts shall be investigated upon reports and dealt with decisively.

“I want to assure you that I have no reluctance to wilding the big stick, this is the time when people and entities that we regulate must comply, we must do the right thing.

“We will stop at nothing in wilding the big stick or hammer in ensuring that the do the right thing  for the benefit of Nigerians,” he said.

According to him, if invested, we will come down on any bank found wanting;

The CBN boss explained that the redeployment of some members of staff and some departments to Lagos state was for efficiency, save cost and not for political reasons as peddle in some quarters.

He said that it was only wise to move the Banking Supervision Department to Lagos state where all the banks have their headquarters for easy and efficient monitoring.

He said that the transfer was a tool to balance the bank’s skills across its offices nationwide to ensure accurate data generation and response to monetary issues.

On the weakening of the Naira, Cardoso stressed the need for attitudinal change that will benefit local economy by patronising local production.

He said that an estimated N$40 billion is spent of education and medical toursim by Nigerians which is an equivalent of Nigeria’s foreign reserve.

He urged Nigerians to patronise local content to strengthen the Naira against the dollar and stabilise the economy.