Niger orders arrest of residents rejecting old naira notes

Abubakar Bello, governor of Niger, has ordered the arrest of residents who are rejecting the old naira notes.

In a statement on Tuesday, Ahmad Matane, secretary to the state government, said the old naira currency remains a legal tender, warning that residents found rejecting it should be punished according to the law.

Matane said the government has observed that some residents, particularly traders in the state, were refusing to accept the old notes.

He said the situation has brought hardship to many citizens and added that residents who refuse to accept it would be arrested and prosecuted.

“It has come to the notice of the government that some people and traders were rejecting the old Naira notes from the citizens, a development that is not healthy thereby inflicting untold hardship on the people of the state,” Matane said.

He urged the people to carry on with their legal businesses and report persons rejecting the old notes to security agencies in the state.

Meanwhile, like Kogi, Kaduna, and Zamfara, the Niger government was said to have earlier instituted a suit against the federal government on the naira redesign policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).