Some Nigerian banks have commenced paying old N1,000, N500 notes to customers following the Supreme Court judgment, which extended the validity to 31 December.
Daily Trust reports banks in the City of Kano and Abuja paid customers, who came for withdrawals in old Naira notes on Monday.
GTBank and Access Bank branches, for instance, paid out the old banknotes in Abuja.
In Lagos, Sterling Bank and Access Bank at Iyana Ipaja loaded the old N1,000 and N500 notes on their ATMs and customers were withdrawing them.
An unidentified source in GTB said they received a directive from their management to begin paying old notes in their vault.
The source said: “The problem is that taking the old notes from customers will require the CBN form as we don’t have any directive in that regard”.
it is yet to be confirmed if the CBN had officially issued a bank-wide circular instructing the Deposit money bank to comply.
According to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Act of 2007, the apex bank is a fully autonomous body that regulates financial institutions in the country.
CBN’s duties include ensuring monetary and price stability and rendering economic advice to the Federal Government.
Banks can only act on CBN directives, but rather only, which explains the confusion surrounding the implementation of the recirculation of old naira notes.
