The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said it will investigate the current shortage of cash in Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) being experienced by bank customers in Lagos State.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the CBN‘s Acting Director, Corporate Communications, Mr. Osita Nwanisobi, disclosed this yesterday, while reacting to some bank customers’ complaints that the recent boom in Agent Banking is responsible for ATMs not having money to dispense any more. Nwanisobi said that ATMs were introduced so as to ease the sufferings of the people.
The Director also described as “preposterous” insinuations that the apex bank conspired with commercial banks to ensure there was no money in the machines.
“It is highly preposterous for anyone to say that CBN connived with banks to deprive people of their money this season. The primary purpose for which ATMs were introduced, is to ease the sufferings of Nigerians and to make banking easier and convenient. I assure the public that CBN will investigate the matter,” he said.
New Telegraph had, in a recent report, stated that the reluctance of Police personnel to fully resume escort service to banks in the wake of the #EndSARS crisis, coupled with the uptick in economic activity occasioned by the Christmas rush, had worsened the shortage of cash in the banking system.
The newspaper’s findings showed that in recent weeks, there has been an increase in complaints by bank customers in Lagos, Abuja and other major cities, about difficulty in accessing cash either across the counter or through ATMs.
Indeed, New Telegraph gathered that in a bid to conserve cash, some banks have resorted to not loading all their ATMs as frequently as they used to do, thus leading to long ATM queues.
An authoritative industry source said that while the Christmas rush usually leads to an increase in cash withdrawals at this time of the year, the current shortage of cash in the system has been worsened by the challenges banks have been facing in trying to get Police personnel to perform cash movement duties since the end of the #EndSARS crisis.
The source said: “Following the vicious attacks that were launched on them by hoodlums during the #EndSARS crisis, most of the Police personnel attached to banks for cash movement duties have not resumed for duty. Without Police escort, banks cannot move cash to branches that need it; no bank will take that risk.
Indeed, some banks have had to resort to engaging soldiers for that task.”
According to the bank official, the CBN, which is aware of the problem, has drastically reduced the amount of cash lenders can get from it on a daily basis and has also directed banks to encourage customers to embrace electronic payment channels for their transactions.
The official predicted that the cash shortage problem is not likely to end any time soon, as many of the Police personnel are still too shaken by the catastrophic losses they suffered during the #EndSARS crisis to return to escort duties at the banks.
The #EndSARS crisis broke out on October 20, when security forces in Lagos opened fire on unarmed protesters at the Lekki Toll gate, who had been staging a sit-in for about two weeks, calling for the dissolution of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), a notorious Police unit that had long been accused of extortion, torture and extra-judicial killings, sparking widespread social unrest that saw hoodlums torching many police stations and also wounding and killing several police officers across the country.
