The Supreme Court has again extended the use of the redesigned 200, 500 and 1000 naira notes.
This is the second time the Supreme Court has extended the validity of the old naira notes following a botched currency redesign policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
In October last year, the CBN began the currency swap policy that caused monumental hardship to Nigerians.
To ameliorate the difficulties, many states governments sued the federal government, urging the Supreme Court to reverse the monetary policy.
With the deadline for the affected notes nearing, the Federal government, approached the Supreme Court for another extension of the notes validity.
A seven-member panel of the Supreme Court led by John Okoro had in March ordered the CBN to continue to receive the old notes from Nigerians until 31 December, 2023.
The court had held that the directive of then President Muhammadu Buhari for the redesign of the new notes and withdrawal of the old notes without due consultation was invalid.
Emmanuel Agim, a member of the panel, who read the lead judgement, also condemned the President’s disobedience of the court’s 8 February order that the old notes should be in use.
At Wednesday’s proceedings, the Supreme Court panel led by John Okoro, ruled that the old notes remain legal tender until they are replaced with the redesigned notes.
According to Okoro, the old notes would co-exist as legal tender with the redesigned ones.
The ruling was based on a request by the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), who was accompanied by the acting Director, Civil Appeals, Federal Ministry of Justice, Tijani Gazali (SAN).
The court, in the ruling, reviewed its earlier order that the old notes should cease to be legal tender by the last day of December 2023.
Okoro said “the old versions of 200, 500, 1000 naira notes/currency shall continue to be legal tenders alongside the new or designed versions until the government decides to bring the circulation of the old versions to an end after its consultation with critical stakeholders and after putting all required structures in place.”
Other members of the Supreme Court panel are – Uwani Aba-Aji, Helen Ogunwumiju, Ibrahim Saulawa, Adamu Jauro, Tijani Abubakar and Emmanuel Agim – all agreed with the ruling.
Former President Buhari and ex-CBN governor, Godwin Emefiele, had pursued the naira redesign policy in disregard for the Supreme Court order halting it.
Earlier this month, the CBN announced “its desire to extend the legal tender status deadline of the old design of N200, N500 and N1,000 denominations, ad infinitum.”
The bank also indicated in its statement announcing the plan of the government to approach the Supreme Court to vacate the subsisting order on the matter.
“Thus, all banknotes issued by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), in accordance with Section 20(5) of the CBN Act 2007, will continue to remain legal tender, ad infinitum, even beyond the initial 31 December 2023, deadline.
“The Central Bank of Nigeria is working with the relevant authorities to vacate the subsisting court ruling on the same subject,” the CBN statement had said.
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