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The Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN),has said that it took a number of measures to mitigate the long-term effects of COVID-19 pandemic on the growth prospects of the nation’s economy.
The apex bank’s Governor, Godwin Emefiele, who announced this in his presentation at the 30th annual conference organised by finance reporters in Lagos,said policy measures were introduced to restore stability in the economy by supporting households that have been severely battered by the pandemic.
“Also, targeted interventions were introduced to support critical sectors, such as agriculture, manufacturing, energy, and health.Cumulatively, the bank’s intervention efforts represented about 3.5 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product”,he added.
According to him, the policy measures included a cumulative reduction of the monetary policy rate from 13.5 per cent to 11.5 per cent between May and September 2021 in order to spur lending to the economy and support current recovery of output growth; reduction of the interest rate on CBN intervention loans from nine to five per cent; and a one-year extension of the moratorium on principal repayments for CBN intervention facilities.
According to him, it also included regulatory forbearance granted to banks to restructure loans given to sectors that were severely affected by the pandemic; strengthening of the loan to deposit ratio policy, which had resulted in a significant rise in loans provided by financial institutions to banking customers; and creation of the targeted credit facility to support affected households and businesses through the NIRSAL Microfinance Bank.
He disclosed that N343.21bn had been disbursed to 726,198 beneficiaries, comprising 602,730 households and 123,468 MSMEs.
Meanwhile,the Coalition of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and Abuja Grassroots Projects (AGP) have dissociated themselves from the Monday planned anti-Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) protest.
The groups noted that the protest will be carried out by a faceless group hired by those who are against the President Mohammadu Buhari’s economy agenda and the Governor of CBN, Godwin Emefiele.
The groups, in a statement by its coordinator, Isa Abubakar, disclosed that the plan, “we learnt, is that this faceless fellow and his sponsors will pay miscreants to attack the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), to make a baseless call for the sack of Mr. Godwin Emefiele, Governor of Central Bank, for failing to resign before Thursday, September 23, 2021.
“We are by this statement calling the attention of security agencies, especially the Department of State Services (DSS) and the Nigeria Police Force of the plan of this impostor and his co-travellers to attack the CBN Headquarters and other government institutions after being paid to stage a bribed protest using the name of our group.
“We will like to put on record that these impostors are not members of our group. They are only bent on using our NGO’s name for their selfish interest.
“Our investigation has shown that these people are professional blackmaikers and who are always available to be paid and rented for nefarious activities. We are also, by this statement, disowning the planned protest scheduled for Monday.”
The group urged the security operatives to arrest the leader of the group and his hired crowd, who were paid to smear the President and the CBN Governor’s efforts, which are helping to stabilise the naira.
“We, as a group, pass a vote of confidence on Buhari and Emefiele result oriented efforts in growing our nation’s economy and state it clearly that we are proud of their efforts and condemn this ongoing efforts by desperate political elements to discredit their efforts,” the groups said.
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