 The real reason behind the redesigning of the Nigerian NERA notes, the central bank of Nigerian Sydney announced the design of the new NERA notes in order to enhance the security features and curb counterfeiting. The public outcome was due to concern about the cost of the new design, the burden it will place on small businesses and the need for proper consultation with stakeholders. The National Assembly also raised questions about the cost of the redesign and the potential impact it will have on the economy. The CBN governor has stated that the redesign of the NERA note is aimed at curbing corruption, systemic kidnapping and terrorism and adding value to the currency. The new design is expected to include improved security features that will make it more difficult for counterfeiters to produce fake notes which will help to reduce fraud and other illegal activities. Additionally, the redesigning notes are intended to better reflect the cultural heritage and identity of Nigeria. It has been reported that the cash swap project carried out by the CBN and commercial banks has been plugged by various challenges including insufficient availability of the new NERA notes in circulation. These have led to instances where some individuals and businesses are ordering the new notes and sending them at a higher price. It has created a shortage of the new notes in circulation and has caused difficulties for many Nigerians especially those in rural areas who do not have access to banks and ATMs. The CBN has stated that it is working to address this issue and increase the availability of the new notes but it is a complex and ongoing process. The CBN has stated that the new NERA notes are expected to include improved security features that will make it more difficult for the new NERA to produce fake notes. The CBN has stated that the new NERA notes are expected to include improved security features that will make it more difficult for the Nigerians especially those in rural areas who do not have access to banks and commercial banks. I personally am actually generally bad with cash thankfully so I have not been cash trapped yet over the past maybe one week. I don't know what will happen next week. It is rather sad, rather unfortunate that we are dealing with six world, I thought they said it was a third world. I think it is a tenth world problem. Because you have data, you know how much we draw money, you know how much the bank gets, you know how much, I mean you are the apex bank. It means you are supposed to have data. It is obvious that the central bank does not get appraised by anybody because if he gets appraised by anybody, he would have been fired by now. Two, every claim that they have made is not yesterday that kidnapping started in Nigeria. It is not last week that the hoarding has been ongoing. He has been there for how many years and he never, he didn't think about redesigning in 2020, he didn't think about redesigning in 2019. So every claim, every excuse that they have given or reason for this redesign in my opinion is a lie. There is something else that is prompting this. He knows it, we speculate because we think we know it. But whatever it is that he is doing, he just needs to end it and make life easy for people. It is not until people have started removing clothes in the bank. I saw something yesterday, some lady was naked in the bank. Another one today, a man climbed on top of a table, removed his clothes. We don't have to get to this point. This is 2023. Please. We do not even mention the sheer lack of creativity in redesigning the app thing. Let's not even go there. It says he wants to promote our culture. All you did was just change colours. And those were colours we had before. You just went back to the colours. It is not even fading. A plus. Tell us about the advocate. Do you also look at this from comparing these developments with the likes of China? Because I can also see videos in China where some people say they have not seen China movies for almost 2-3 years. What can you say to that? But the electronic transfers work. They work. We want to compare Nigerian with countries. We have to be careful. Compare Apple with Abalmo. Are you being serious? We are talking about the most tech country in the world. Where technology works, where internet works, where they have 5G. When was the last time you recharged your data from your bank? Can you log in to your bank app to start with? I have logged in to my app. People can log in to their bank. You are talking about electronic transfers. Let's be serious now. Are you aware that there are all those solutions beyond electronic transfers that people are not actually accepting? The likes of KIA code. And that's what they actually use in the likes of China. What are you using to play right now? Where are you right now? KIA code. What have you told me to the last 2 days? KIA code. I just want to know. We cannot access KIA code. Is you in Delta? Who said no? Are you talking about the CBI code? That's something we don't know right now. Do you want to know more about it? Yes. I think I have to come back. You are playing the devil's advocate. Since you are on the advocate. Today, yes. Today, we have the CBI having account of how many points. That's a legal tender fiscal cash they printed and how many is within the vote of the bank and the ones that are outside the bank. But today, they don't have a data of how this money has been spent. So I think what they are trying to achieve is to properly monitor the transaction of how this fiscal cash. The CBI governor was specifically clear of saying we should not expect the higher domination like 541,000 out in terms of availability at all times. Because he is trying to, do you know this policy has been out since 2012. And they have been trying to drive adoption. And you know as Nigerians, if things are not forced, we don't change. Really? We don't move to change. And I believe if we look at it critically, it helps us, this policy is actually going to grow our economy. But that is need for certain amenities. Like I give you an example for using your POS. POS transaction are actually not categorized to say you are using it for point of sales to purchase things at supermarket and what have you. Or you are withdrawing it for cash. That needs categorization so that people could at least buy bag of rice for 5,000 using your POS. So there are needs for stakeholders. That's why I'm saying that there are some stakeholders that are left out why this plan was ongoing. And I believe if all stakeholders are carry alone will have proper orientation and the adoption will not be as crazy as it is right now. Because everybody is actually soft coming for lack of understanding and knowledge of the impact or the possibility of the CBN policy. Yeah. Okay, you say. Yeah, Adam, thanks. Now you are getting closer to the point. The fact that stakeholders have to be put in consideration when you are doing the policy. So it's simple, if you don't want to use cash, then make sure there is a backup plan that works. It's a no brainer. If you don't want me to use A, then provide B or C. In the situation where A is unavailable and I don't have a backup plan or a backup plan to that backup plan, then it becomes useless. Intentions are useless. Nigerians doesn't really care about the intentions right now. We are talking about results. So if you have great intentions, everybody knows there is going to be carrying cash. If you travel abroad, when Nigerians go around with their PTA, they look at you like are you normal. People don't carry cash abroad. But that's because the systems work. The POS is abroad, they work. Why are the roadside POS? How do they become so prevalent? Not because the ATMs don't work and the banks don't work. That's why they were the backup plan. So we just speak to the failure of the system. Really, is there an issue of adoption or implementation? And secondly, maybe we should really take a good look at where the actual reason is coming from. Is it the people of policy makers in critical thinking and implementation? Absolutely. So I think it's more of the policy makers. The policy makers are most of time from banking sector who follow the former sector and a former standard of which sometimes they don't have detailed knowledge or deep knowledge rather of the informal sector. And you agree with me that the informal sector are the true ones that are driving the economy. Because a lot of commodities that we buy from the farmers and what I do, they are more of an informal sector. So before you enact such policy or bring up such policy as this is, there are certain stakeholders in the informal sectors that need, or people who understand the informal sectors that need to be on their own table to see how possible you can encourage them to be part of the policy. Because today, to do a transfer to someone who is selling paper at the whole site, you can guarantee that you get value and some of them don't even have a bank account. So there are a lot of things that are wrong and we should encourage the city to take a bet. As good as the policy could be that is needed for amendment. Well I guess that was some dimension to the reason behind the redesign. I believe that in the days to come we will still know more and hopefully we really advocate that the central bank of Nigeria and the federal government of Nigeria gets a speedy resolution to the crisis that is on ground right now. Because it is, I mean we are advocating for strength but then we need that to be resolved. This is what Ibilola is next after the break.