THE WORRISOME STATE OF OUR NAIRA

Opinion 

Maybe you’ve noticed it or not, I don’t know, maybe you’re greatly concerned about it, it all depends on you, however the view and perspective of the government towards the present state of our national currency is really worrisome and it calls for urgent intervention by our government to give a standing order or rule on how the Naira is being managed, handled and spent, if possible as it may deem.

The national currency, the Naira is one of the national identity of the country, Nigeria, it promotes out national image all over the world, it is a vital significance of our image, it should be valued, it should be honoured, not worshipped, it should be handled with care, it should be promptly taken care of, it should not be dented, neither should it have any ‘injury’ in it.

Taking a cue from ourselves as having an injury or wound, portrays same to the Naira, only that if it could talk we would have known the pain it passes through as we mis-managed it.

I am deeply concerned over the state of our currencies in time past, and I keep on wondering, whether the federal government or the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is not sure of what to do or rather they are not aware of these dirty, battered, tattered Naira notes in our societies.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is the sole issuer of legal tender money throughout the Nigerian Federation. It controls the volume of money supplied in the economy in order to ensure monetary and price stability. The Currency & Branch Operations Department of the CBN is in charge of currency management, through the procurement, distribution/supply, processing, reissue and disposal/disintegration of bank notes and coins.

Peradventure, the CBN don’t even know what to do to curtail these careless attitudes, who knows? And as said earlier, I feel pained anytime I spend or collect the dirty notes, and on some cases, I have to sellotape these notes when it has become unbearable for useful purposes.

Now, coming back to our ‘constituted authorities’ what are they feeling like, if they claim not to have a comprehensive understanding of how the Nigerian Naira is being manipulated and embarrassed by its citizens? Are they not seeing other nations currencies and have they compared it to ours? How did they feel if they indeed have our love and of the nation at heart.

Also, the blame should not be on the government and the CBN only, also we as the citizens really, really, need to change our attitude concerning the handling of Nigeria’s naira notes. Some goes to the extent of keeping monies inside their shoes, just for the sake of keeping it. While some fold it and rumpled it inside their wallets.

On the side of our market women and men, there is a need for orientation on our currencies is being kept as some kept it inside their underwears and this makes the Naira to accumulate sweat and at end it becomes too lenient, not strong again and therefore easy to tear.

It is so terrible giving a taxi driver N200 note, you’ll be surprised at the dirty looking notes he would squeeze in your hands, while you ask him to change it and the next thing is for him to marry you with someone that is, he would join your change with someone else’s so you and the other guy would have to start looking for change yourselves.

Sometimes he would just dip the change in your hand and he runs to hang on the moving vehicle, what do you do except to look at him and wished the vehicle develops a problem which would halt his journey.

These so-called conductors don’t care what they give you as change, go to the markets, you dare not put some NAIRA notes close to your nose. Even in banks, across the counters or through Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), I have severally received dirty notes from the ATM. How do we handle these notes flying everywhere? Are these not same money flying around the place from one person to another?

Indeed, there is a need to engineer our thoughts towards the ability of handling our national currency, we shouldn’t value other nations currencies than our own, as there is no place like home, we pledge allegiance to US Dollars, UK Pounds, Euros and yet our Naira keeps deteriorating. We placed more value on these foreign currencies while our national currency bleeds to death.

Kindly permit me to digress a little bit, it is this same mindset that makes our national currency to keep on falling at the exchange marker, now its not a matter of Buhari’s government downplayed it’s existence or not, but what are we doing inside our own confines.

We patronise foreign goods, pay to them through their currencies and yet our own national figure is yet to be awaken from death. We all have the work to do aside putting much work on our leaders, though they too need to enforce laws to keep it more stringent and strong.

Therefore, as a patriotic Nigerian, I am on behalf of every Nigerian appealing to federal government, the CBN to find a way out towards ensuring a good and clean Naira notes, and all Nigerians to ensure a smooth way of handling these notes.

It is our image be and how do we feel when we look awkward in a picture? So to avoid that, It’s important to handle clean monies. We can do something.

‘Yanju Uwala is a Writer and Child Rights Advocate. You can reach him on Twitter via: @samade327. SMS only: 09094406827