By Chimaobi Afiauwa, Abuja
The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Dr. Yemi Cardoso, has been implored not to repeat the same mistakes made by his predecessor, Godwin Emefiele.
Deputy Spokesman for the House of Representatives, Philip Agbese, gave this advice when elder statesman and former Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh, paid him a courtesy visit to his office, The Punch reports.
Agbese, in a statement, was appalled that Cardoso and his team have toed the same path as Emefiele, churning out the same monetary policies that crippled Nigeria’s economy.
The all-time low nosediving of the naira, which traded at N1,200 for a dollar on Monday in the official exchange market, elicited Agbese’s reaction.
The lawmaker criticized the apex bank’s lifting of the restriction on the 43 items prohibited from accessing foreign exchange from the official foreign exchange windows, describing it as “putting the cart before the horse.”
The statement reads, “The recent spike in the exchange rate of the dollar is a clear indication that the new CBN leadership has gotten things wrong from the start.
“The freefall of the naira in the unofficial market has been exacerbated by the removal of currency restrictions on the official market. These restrictions had previously propped up the naira’s value.
“The lifting of the ban on the importation of some items at a time when our imports are already high and local companies are struggling to survive has shown that we are far from the end of the troubles at the moment.
“One would expect the CBN to increase the number of items so that local production for domestic consumption will increase and impact positively on the economy. You can see how the dollar rate is rising. What it means is that all those who used to go to the parallel market for dollars are now going to the government to demand it.
“The CBN wanted to close the gap between the official and the black market to discourage round-tripping, but do they have the capacity to fund the dollar demand? They don’t have it. So, it is a cheap and lazy way of managing the monetary policy of the country so that people will say the government is working.
“But the truth of the matter is that the business proposition is not valid; the CBN did not interact with the stakeholders. This policy will make Nigeria lose all the gains that we may have made as a result of the ban.
“Lifting this ban without a response from fiscal policy, not by increasing tariffs on these items but by deploying non-tariff measures such as levies, may expose the local manufacturers of these products to undue competition from foreign producers whose governments provide various production subsidies.”
