The introduction of the new naira cash was met with somewhat of a ridicule by most Nigerians. Nigerians are mostly sceptical about the policies made by their government, and the case of the new naira wasn’t an exception.
However, banking on the belief that the Nigerian Government isn’t serious with the new naira notes introduction, they let it get late. Now, there is situation of how difficult it is to find cash anywhere.
How Difficult it is to Find Cash Anywhere
The issue is that the Federal Government of Nigeria have enacted this policy of new naira notes sometime ago. Nigerians, with high sense of disbelief for their government, couldn’t trust the government to make this policy effective. Thus, the new naira notes were treated with ridicule.
Nevertheless, the government put January 31, 2023, as the deadline for the submission of old naira notes. This means by this date old naira notes will cease to be legal tenders in Nigeria or Nigeria’s currency.
It was only a week or a few days to the deadline that Nigerians started to take the policy seriously. This is after Godwin Emefiele, the CBN governor, insisted that the deadline won’t be shifted. Nigerians begun going to the banks to submit their old notes.
Later, the deadline was shifted to 10 February, 2023.
From the beginning of February, Nigerians suddenly realized that there wasn’t enough money in circulation anymore. There was no cash. For most of the people to pay they had to resort to transfer or mobile banking.
This sudden change affected a lot of business owners and petty traders. For one, a lot of Nigerians didn’t have bank accounts. Even if they had bank accounts, there was no knowledge or phone to use for mobile banking. So, there was still lots of dependence on cash.
A lot of Nigerians go to banks in search of cash. They go to banks’ ATMs. They go to banking halls of different banks. There is long queue everywhere in most Nigeria’s credit institutions.
Some go as early as 4 a. m. to secure a place in the queue. Others sleep close to the bank just to have access to their money. At times, there are more than 200 people seeking to get money from a single bank.
After standing and seeking to get money the entire day, most go home without any cash. Averagely, some go home with around 10,000 to 5,000 naira cash. Even POS operators are strapped of cash.
This case might continue for sometime. It might continue for a period of 4 weeks or more. It will take Nigerians getting used to transfer and mobile banking for the case to begin to disappear.
Verdict: What does this means for Nigerians and Nigerian Businesses?
This simply means that Nigerians will have to adapt to mobile banking. Without mobile banking taking over, there is little or nothing to be achieved as there would still be limited cash in circulation.
For businesses to survive and not lose customers, business owners should use transfer and mobile banking for businesses. In addition, they can also purchase POS machines. With this POS machines, they can ask for the ATM cards of their customers and deduct their money from there.