What’s Coins gat to do with it?
The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Prof. Charles Soludo, has said that Nigerians are not accepting coins again because the currency has lost both value and its purchasing power. Soludo stated this on Friday as the guest lecturer at a seminar organised by The Forum, a group of medical students at the University College Hospital, Ibadan. He noted that the development was not, however, peculiar to Nigeria stressing that most developing countries of the world were also facing similar challenges.
He explained that citizens of some advanced countries were accepting and spending their coins with pride because the value of their coins was higher. He said, “You can take a bus from one destination to another in London with a coin but I doubt whether you can do so in Nigeria with a N1 coin”
He said all strategies mapped out by the bank to make Nigerians accept the use of coins were unsuccessful because the people could hardly buy any meaningful thing with a coin. “If they attempt to carry a large quantity in order to buy something it becomes a burden not only to
them but also to the traders,” he added.
The CBN boss traced the growing poverty in the land and the alarming wide gap between the rich and the poor to the refusal of banks to grant credit facilities to small scale industrialists. According to Soludo, “Operators of the SMEs are not accessing loans from the commercial banks because they cannot scale through the hurdles of the stringent conditions of the banks. All hands must be on the deck if we have to tackle the growing inflation which has left majority of our people uncatered for. Access to credit facilities must be looked into if we really want to reduce the numbers of poor people in this country.”
Soludo also advised stakeholders in the formulation of educational policy to address the situation whereby only children of the elites in the society had access to quality education. The CBN boss noted that the reforms he carried out in the banking system had achieved great results in the last two years. He said rather than leading to loss of jobs as being feared in some quarters, the consolidation, he noted, had created more jobs while more Nigerians had opened bank accounts because of their confidence in the banking sector.
He said, “As at today, two banks in Nigeria are bigger than the entire 89 banks before the consolidation and we have more branches of commercial banks in an the nooks and crannies of the country. “Before the consolidation, none of our 89 banks could make the list of the best 100, 000 banks in the world as at 2006, 12 out of the current 25 had made the list, less than one year after consolidation.”
He also explained that the fourth largest bank in South Africa before the consolidation was bigger than all the 89 banks in Nigeria but that today, the asset base of just two banks in Nigeria is bigger than all the banks in South Africa. (Sunday Aborishade)
Interesting article I may add but I think we ought to take a wholistic approach to solving our economic problems. People wont spend coins even if there were N20 coins and not notes. Africa needs a complete overhaul of its leaders and followers alike. Change must start from within. People must be treated as though they have value before they can in turn treat whatever is related to the country as if it has value.
It’s a law of sowing and reaping. Once Nigerians begin to get value from the people they elected into power commensurate to the opportunities that lie begging in the country. It would be easy for Nigerians to place value on anything Nigerian.
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May 27th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
True.
Its saddening that we have such beautiful coins and can’t spend them.
I was in cotonou recently and was surprised that coins were very well being spent there. Though the value of their currency was lesser than ours.
We need more erudite and diligent nigerians like soludo who make such things happen…and Im gonna be one