The new Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, on Thursday unveiled his blueprint for the economy stating that he would, through his vision for the country create a central bank that is professional, apolitical and people focused.
Emefiele while addressing journalists at the apex bank headquarters in Abuja, said he would reposition the apex bank into an institution that would dissipate its energies into building a resilient financial system that will serve the growth and development needs of the country.
Here’s the agenda as outlined by the governor:
- To pursue a gradual reduction in key interest rates and include unemployment rate in monetary policy decisions;
- Maintain exchange rate stability and aggressively shore up foreign exchange reserves;
- Strengthen risk-based supervision mechanism of Nigerian banks to ensure overall health and banking stability;
- To build up sector-specific expertise in banking supervision to reflect loan concentration of the banking industry;
- To consider and announce measures to effectively address the anomaly in macro-prudential space;
- Abolish fees associated with limits on deposits and reconsider ongoing practice in which fees associated with limits on withdrawals accrue to banks alone;
- To introduce a broad spectrum of financial instruments to boost specific enterprise areas in agriculture, manufacturing, health and oil and gas;
- Establish Secured Transaction and National Collateral Registry that will improve access to information on borrowers and assist lenders to make good credit decisions;
- Build resilient financial infrastructure that will serve the need of the lower end of the market, especially those without collateral;
- Renew vigorous advocacy for the creation of commercial course for quick adjudication of almost and related offences.
