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The Confederation of Northern Groups (CNG) said President Muhammadu Buhari’s response to the Nigerian Supreme Court’s naira swap order was simply an attempt to deceive the country.
CNG spokesman Abdul-Azeez Suleiman said it was curious that the naira shortage showed no signs of easing, days after the president issued the directive.
“Instead, the situation is getting worse every day as old and new banknotes are being deliberately withheld by the government. As innocent families starve, businesses collapse and tensions rise, Buhari and his lackey, Central Bank Governor Godwin E. Mayfair seemed isolated or living in total denial.
“By now everyone knows that Buhari is just deceiving the country by forging a directive to CBN to respect the Supreme Court decision, which he knows very well that he did not mean to enforce.
“Emefiele, who is also Buhari’s errand, pretends that he is following orders only to further impose a cash crunch on citizens,” the group said.
CNG wondered why neither Buhari nor Emefiele found it helpful to address the nation on the new directive as they did when presenting policy to the nation.
“Instead, Buhari and Emefiele just issued clumsy, vague statements through their spokespersons, as if things weren’t serious enough.
“At this point, it is clear that Buhari is using Emefiele Buhari in a sinister plan to re-examine the country whose draconian, ill-conceived, authoritarian currency review in 1984 caused pain of untold magnitude and widespread frustration and resulted in the deaths of several Nigerians.
“The dishonesty of Buhari’s statements since CNG’s investigations in the northern states of Nigeria further substantiates the fact that since the deceitful instructions were issued, neither old nor new depository banks have been given repayment notes.
“This explains why banks issue less than 5,000 naira to customers who have a legitimate need to use their own money, which is contrary to the Supreme Court order that no president or any government official has the right to deny citizens access to their own money.
“Sadly, Buhari has chosen the path of disgrace, dictatorship and aristocracy towards the end of his term and will leave a very bad legacy for the country.
“In the process, Buhari and Emerfil not only vilified vital state institutions like the CBN, but also ridiculed a national judiciary that we deem unacceptable, baseless and disgraceful.
“We call on the National Assembly to act swiftly to save the image of the CBN, the courts and the country from the impending decay and degradation by curbing the emerging authoritarian tendencies in the country.
“We also call on the patriotic governors who initiated the legal process and an ungodly monetary policy regime to step up their efforts to save the country, its financial institutions and the judiciary.
“In this regard, we recommend that they meet with the president-elect and figure out a way out to stop the current trend of the country toward greater conflict.
“We urge all Nigerians to remain vigilant about the direction our country is heading and to rise up against these baseless and inexcusable injustices.
“We draw the attention of the international community that if any ecstasy in the system results from their deceitful, insincere handling of these murderous economic policy issues, the ultimate responsibility rests with Buhari and Emefil,” CNG said.
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