CBN to upgrade Nigeria’s digital currency

By Uthman Salami

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has disclosed that it would go ahead with plans to upgrade Nigeria’s Digital Currency, otherwise known as Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) or the eNaira, noting that this would enable the currency to be used on wider variety of goods and services.

The goal is to keep to stringent crypto regulations that had a negative impact on Nigeria’s fintech sector.

This was disclosed by CBN’s Branch Controller, Bariboloka Koyor during his speech at a campaign to familiarize businesses with the eNaira in Lagos on May 9.

At the campaign, Koyor announced that “starting next week, there is going to be an upgrade on the eNaira wallet app that will allow you to do transactions such as paying for DSTV or electric bills or even paying for flight tickets.”

He further added that the eNaira would be the only way to receive financial assistance from the government which highlights the importance of early adoption.

Koyor also stated that, “This is a project that the CBN rolled out to reach every Nigerian in terms of financial inclusion and in terms of efficiency, reliability and safety of banking transactions so that we can do banking transactions very easily and safely and the people in Nigeria can enjoy the benefit of the eNaira.”

Nigerians have been rushing to adopt crypto as the naira has fallen by over 209% over the past six years. According to a report by KuCoin, around 33.4 million Nigerians already own or trade cryptocurrencies.

However, CBN’s restrictions on crypto are extreme and many crypto users have suffered under them and two crypto traders’ accounts have even been frozen.

A report published by the Secretary Generals of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development stated that restrictions on crypto in Nigeria have negatively impacted millions who are living from the sector.