The Association of Bureau De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON) on Monday said that a competitive Diaspora Remittance market space would engender Naira stability.
Aminu Gwadabe, President, ABCON, made the assertion in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos, against the backdrop of the recent CBN Naira for dollar policy issued on March 5.
Mr. Gwadabe lauded the apex bank’s policy but said more needed to be done for the policy to achieve its intended objective of shoring up the value of the Naira through liquidity boost.
He said there was the need to break the monopoly of certain players in the remittances space by allowing the participation of other stakeholders like BDCs in the realm of remittances.
According to him, Kenya, Ghana, South Africa, etc, have all deepened their remittance space through a competitive market space.
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The ABCON boss said that measures taken by the aforementioned countries had enabled them to achieve volumes, leading to the stability of their local currencies.
He said the Naira for dollar measure was among the many recent strategies deployed by the CBN to attract more Diaspora remittances into the official channel and address the foreign exchange liquidity concerns in the market.
“There is no doubt the incentive will be somehow attractive to the targeted beneficiaries of the remittances and therefore aimed to address concerns of one of the principal ally (sic) in the chain of remittances,” Mr. Gwadabe said.
He said that statistics from the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM) suggested that over 17 million Nigerians legally residing in the Diaspora remitted over $20 billion in 2020 in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Little Info…
According to a circular issued by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), N5 is to be paid to all recipients of diaspora remittances for every US dollar received.
This directive was directed to all deposit money banks and international money transfer operators.
With Agency Report
