President Muhammadu Buhari has described the Bureau de Change (BDC) business in Nigeria as a scam that had been draining the nation’s economy.
He made clear that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) would not resume the sale of foreign exchange to such Bureaux de Change.
The President who spoke at an interactive meeting with Nigerians living in Kenya today,
alleged that some bank and government officials used surrogates to run the BDCs and prosper at public expense by obtaining foreign exchange from government at official rates and selling it at much higher rates.
According to President Buhari, because of the lucrativeness of the BDCs, it had increased from 74 in in 2005 to about 2,800 now, saying: “we don’t have the Dollars to give to the BDCs. Let them go and get it from wherever they can, other than the Central Bank.
“We will use our foreign exchange for industry, spare parts and the development of needed infrastructure.”
The President reaffirmed his conviction that about a third of petroleum subsidy payments under the previous administration was bogus, adding: “they just stamped papers and collected our foreign exchange.”
He also made it clear that he was not convinced that Nigeria and its people will derive any tangible benefit from an official devaluation of the Naira.
The President insisted that while export-driven economies could benefit from devaluation of their currencies, devaluation will only result in further inflation and hardship for the poor and middle classes in Nigeria’s import-dependent economy.
He stressed that he had no intention of bringing further hardship on the country’s poor who, he said, have suffered enough already.
Likening devaluing the Naira to having it “killed,” President Buhari said that proponents of devaluation will have to work much harder to convince him that ordinary Nigerians will gain anything from it.
Buhari then appealed to Nigerians studying abroad to bear with his administration as it strives to address the challenges they are facing as a result of new foreign exchange measures.
He said that he was optimistic that the Nigerian economy will stabilize soon with the efficient implementation of measures and policies that have been introduced by his administration. [myad]
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