Cash Crunch: APC piles pressure on Malami over compliance to supreme court order

Ahead of Saturday’s presidential poll, the ruling All progressive congress (APC) is not leaving any stone unturned to ensure the enforcement of the supreme court order over the controversial naira swap policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

Yesterday, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Mr Abubakar Malami was at the national secretariat of the party at the behest of the Senator Abdullahi Adamu-led the national working committee (NWC) of the party.

Malami’s appearance came barely less than 24 hours after the APC, alongside members of the progressives governors forum (PGF) called on him and President Muhammadu Buhari to comply with the supreme court directive.

Malami who was chauffer driven into the national secretariat of the party in Abuja at about 3,30 p.m was accompanied by Governors Ahmed Nasir el-Rufai (Kaduna), Bello Matawalle (Zamfara) and Atiku Bagudu (Kebbi) who initiated the suit challenging the February 15 CBN deadline on the usage of the old N200, N500 and N1000 notes.

The former governor of Zamfara state, Alh Abdulaziz Yari also attended the closed-door parley held between the APC chairman, Malami, el-Rufai, Bagudu and Matawalle.

Malami however declined to speak to reporters at the end of the meeting at about 4.30 pm just as efforts to reach any of the aforementioned governors met the brick wall as Adamu who saw them off simply said: “We are on the same page, there is nothing to say for now.”

The Supreme Court adjourned to February 22, 2023 the suit filed by some governors to challenge the naira redesign policy of the CBN.

The CBN had originally fixed January 31 as the deadline for the old N200, N500 and N1,000 notes to be returned to banks and cease to be legal tender.

But the deadline was extended to February 10, as outrage heightened from Nigerians over the scarcity of banknotes.

But before the February 10 deadline could elapse, Kogi, Kaduna and Zamfara states approached the Supreme Court to stop the CBN from going ahead with the deadline.