APC: Emefiele, Malami must resign for misleading Buhari on naira policy

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in the north-west has asked Godwin Emefiele, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and Abubakar Malami, minister of justice, to resign from their offices.

The party made the call following a verdict of the supreme court on Friday which held that the old naira notes are legal tender till December 31, 2023.

The apex bank unveiled the new N200, N500, and N1,000 notes on December 23, 2022, and fixed February 10 as the deadline for the use of the old ones.

This is in spite of a temporary injunction by the supreme court that the old notes were still legal tender.

The naira redesign policy created a cash crunch that affected the lives of the citizens.

In a statement on Friday, Salihu Lukman, vice-chairman of the APC in the north-west, said it was unfortunate that President Muhammadu Buhari was misled into “illegality and abuse of executive power”.

“Therefore, if indeed, the cashless policy of the Federal Government was supposedly designed to conform with extant legal provisions of the Nigerian Federation, now that it turned out in the direct opposite, both the CBN Governor, Mr. Emefiele and the attorney-general of the federation, Mr. Malami should accept the limitations of both their knowledge of the law and commitment to democracy by resigning from their respective offices forthwith,” Lukman said.

“Rule of law is fundamental to democracy and individuals who flagrantly violate the laws or promote acts that breach the constitution of the federal republic of Nigeria must not be tolerated.

“We call on Nigerians to take note of the fact that the crusade against the federal government’s cashless policy was led by APC, not minding the attempt to sensationally politicize it to the benefit of opposition political parties and their candidates in this election season.

“It is gratifying that Nigerians resisted the antics of subversive politicians who wanted to use such crude methods, including inflicting untold hardship and pains on Nigerians to provoke citizens into voting against the APC during the February 25 presidential and national assembly elections.

“We commend and salute Nigerians for their faith in our party, APC, and determination to support our party and our candidates during the 2023 elections.”