New Naira Notes: Adopt Other Channels Of Payment Ahead Of January Deadline — CBN

As the January 31, 2023, deadline for the circulation of the old notes is fast approaching, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has encouraged citizens to adopt other channels of payment.

Sallam Alada, the Director, Legal Services and Legal Adviser of the CBN, gave this advice on Tuesday in Akure, Ondo State during a monitoring exercise on  Automated Teller Machines by a team from the apex bank to know if banks were loading their machines with the new naira notes.

The team visited some Automated Teller Machines galleries along Hospital road, Arakale, Alagbaka, FUTA, and Oba Adesida road in Akure.

Alada said cash payment is not the only medium of payment, adding that there are other channels like electronic banking, e-naira, and money transfer from phones among others.

“The essence of this programme is to encourage cashless.

"For Nigerians who don’t have access, there’s USSD where you can use a non-browsing phone to do some of these transactions.

"This country needs to move forward and join other nations where cash is no longer the king.

“The CBN issued its vision 2025 payment system, which is a confirmation of the fact that Nigeria is ahead of many countries when it comes to the development of the payment system.

"How well do we want to confirm that we are way ahead?

"The ATM card you are holding is much more sophisticated than most of the cards that we have in other countries, we need to continue to lead the way.

“E-naira is another form of payment channel and CBN is actually expanding the scope of merchants that are accepting e-naira.

"Jump into e-naira, open your wallet, you will meet anybody in CBN to teach you how.

"You can open an e-naira wallet apart from your regular naira wallet where you don’t have bank accounts.”