The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has denied issuing any new directive to commercial banks in response to the Supreme Court's judgement to keep the old naira notes in circulation alongside the new ones until December 31. According to the CBN spokesperson, Isa Abdulmumin, no official statement has been released on the matter. However, a senior management source confirmed that both the old and new notes are legal tender, and banks are currently issuing them to customers. The Supreme Court had earlier ordered that the old N500 and N1000 notes, which were phased out by the Federal Government, should remain in circulation until December.
SaharaReporters had reported that some commercial banks had started dispensing the old naira notes, including the N500 and N1000 denominations. A resident of Ilorin, Kwara State, had confirmed receiving old N1,000 notes from an ATM machine of Guaranty Trust Bank. A banker also corroborated this, stating that some banks had started dispensing the old notes, but his bank was yet to receive the go-ahead due to uncertainty surrounding the validity of the notes as legal tender.
The Supreme Court had ruled that President Muhammadu Buhari's directive to the CBN to redesign and withdraw old notes of N200, N500, and N1,000 without consulting the states, the Federal Executive Council (FEC), the National Council of State, and other stakeholders was unconstitutional. The court observed that the implementation of the policy was done without reasonable notice, as required by the CBN Act. The CBN is yet to react to the court's decision on the policy, which has subjected Nigerians to hardships in recent weeks.
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