 And it's time for our second hot topic and it's good to know that you're still there. Experts warn that CBN and NARA float may crash in a short time. Even as president, Nubu meets with the CBN governor to seek the acting governor, to seek urgent intervention, to stabilize the NARA and improve liquidity in the market. I've been joined by Mr. Shegu Shopiton, principal partner, Woodridge and Scott Consulting. Good morning to you, Mr. Shopiton. It's a pleasure to have you join us this morning. Good morning, Madam. Thanks for having me. Good morning, Nigerians. So, you must have read the details of the meeting that took place between the president and the acting governor of the CBN on Monday. What's your take of that meeting and some of the things that the CBN governor said? Well, I mean, it's an admission that the policy pronouncements by this government, I mean, the last since they've come on board, is not working. You know, I mean, what the CBN and beyond before this meeting took place, the CBN governor had also come out to admit that our diaspora remittances was, had crushed significantly, and that diasporas were using non-official means of getting their funds to their relatives in the country, you know, and that's a very significant admission on his part. And he's said it by way of suggesting that this was economic sabotage and that, you know, that there were some strong measures that was going to be taken against, you know, people or some stringent controls put in place. And I thought that, you know, this again, but this is my own feeling, what I've said consistently through the months since all of this started, that the government simply may not have a clear idea what they're doing and that there may be a lack of thorough intellectual regal with regards to policy formulation you know, on the part of government agencies and maybe the government itself. So the precedent meeting with the CBN governor, one hopes would result in a careful revision of the outcomes of the policy pronouncements of this government since they came on board and corrective measures being taken. One would hope that that would be the outcome of that meeting. One would hope that the president would have been adequately briefed by the CBN governor and other economic experts and advisors that the president has access to, which regards to the dangers that lie ahead. And one must also not forget that the president is not exactly a greenhorn when it comes to economic matters. He is a qualified accountant. He is not alien to financial matters. He is not alien to economic analysis. You know, he should know. But of course, we must also remind ourselves that he is also a politician. And a lot of times when political leaders make decisions, they don't always make those decisions purely on the merits of the economics behind those issues. Sometimes political considerations might come in. And I think maybe that's what we're seeing. I would only strongly advise the president and his advisors and his handlers that, you know, the time for politics is far gone. And we need to hunker down, roll up our sleeves and look at what is happening in the country on the back of the policy pronouncements that this administration has made across board. You know, I can reel out a number of policy changes that have been made. And it's very clear that they're not working. So we need to step back, look at why they're not working, look at what we need to do very quickly before we go into tailspin. Right now, what we're seeing is the beginning of a career in out of control of a vehicle that is driving at very high speed. And we all know what happens if you're driving at 160 kilometers per hour, and you fly over just a small bump on the road, there's a possibility that the car will go into a tailspin, spin several times, some assault and, you know, kill the occupants. And that's what we're seeing right now. I have said repeatedly on air, on as many platforms as I've had access to that the president needs to slow down, you know, the cabinet is not in place yet. The ministers have been screened and approved. They haven't been assigned with portfolios yet. It's not a time to make very far reaching, profound policy pronouncements the way the president has done, has done in the last two months. Those policy pronouncements ought to be preceded by very thorough, exhaustive, extremely detailed analysis of where we are, where we'd like to be, how we're going to get there, the potential fallouts of, you know, make those policy pronouncements and how to mitigate the impact of that fallout, you know, on the people. We have to remember that governance is pressed down foremost about the people. When you talk about economics, whether you're talking about foreign exchange prizes or exchange rates, whether you're talking about PMS prizes, whether you're talking about education at the end of it all, it's about the people and what happens to the citizens of a country. So that must be at the back of our minds as we address all of these issues. And that has to be the overriding concern that the president should carry along with him as these decisions are being made and rolled out. Yeah, yet again, we have been promised new policies by the acting CBN governor with this meeting he had with the president. He's saying that new policies are going to be introduced in a few days time that would adversely affect the speculators that he's blaming for the scarcity of effects. Look, the scarcity of effects is not the result of speculation. Of course, there will always look, there's no marketing in, you know, anywhere in the world where you would not have some measure of speculation. Speculation is an intrinsic and maybe you could even argue an important part of market making anywhere in the world in any type of market, whether you're talking about foreign exchange markets or you're talking about commodity markets or, you know, financial markets, whatever it is, speculators will always speculate. You can't blame speculation for failure of price control mechanisms. You can't blame speculators for failure of proper management of the factors that control the flow forward and backwards of demand and supply in any market. It's not about speculation, it's about policy, right? And it's about time that the central bank governor and the president understand this and relate with the issues on the basis of this. What is, so when the CBN governor says that there will be, you know, new policy initiatives to address speculation, I'm worried because I think that we do not need more controls. I think we need less controls. You know, so that statement sounds as if we're going to have some more stringent measures introduced, maybe some sort of penalties if you are caught, you know, in the speculation or maybe around tripping, they'll probably target the banks because, you know, the banks, the bureau, they change and other financial other players in the financial markets who are authorized dealers are the ones that the CBN has direct control over. They don't have direct control over UNI or organizations, large corporate organizations that access the markets, you know, for foreign exchange. So they'll probably target the banks with various potential punitive measures if they are found in, quote, agents, speculation and all of that. I would suggest that this would be a problem. This would be a mistake. What I think we need amongst other things is to look very critically, to critically examine the control policies that we have in place from the CBN to the players in the financial markets. There's an exchange control department in the central bank of Nigeria, and they come out with circulars, you know, and other policy documents that define the rules, the rules and regulations that players must follow in accessing the markets, right? So for example, in terms of importation into the country, before you can import goods or services, there are forms that you need to fill. There's a form M, there's a form A, there's an NXP from Q for small business for small businesses and all of that, you know, these forms must be completed and must be approved by your bank before you can access foreign exchange in the official window if that's what you want to do. If you want to repatriate your funds, when you bring investments in, you've got to get a capital importation certificate approved by the central bank. When you're repatriating your funds or your profits, you have to get approval from the CBN. And there are a lot of documentation, documentary requirements that follow that approval. My own suggestion is that we need to look at all of these controls and reduce them to the barest minimum. You can't have a market that is totally free of regulation and totally free of controls. And we also have to understand that there's a difference between regulation and controls, right? There's a difference between data collection and data gathering for policy formulation purposes, for regulation purposes, and controlling every single activity and every single movement that happens in the market. The controls that we've had in place, we've had them for decades. I think for goodness sake, I have been in the financial sector for the better part of 30 years. And I tell you that even as a young banker, some of the policies that we had in place when I was a young banker, are still there today. 30 years later, the world has changed. The world has not gone. The world is a bigger place. The borders are shrinking and sometimes are completely disappeared, especially in terms of financial flows. So the amount of control that you can put in place, you've got to be careful about how you go about it. Yeah, you're just bringing me to my next question, which is how much confidence do we have in this present central bank of Nigeria of ours? I mean, some of the problems we're having today is as a result of the activities and policies of the central bank. And some analysts are predicting a black swan may be upon Nigeria soon as a result of the debt of the central bank. The debt that the central bank is in some big U.S. companies. Should they be asking for their money in the nearest future? Well, I mean, foreign borrowings, foreign debt obligations don't necessarily get called in on a whim. Usually that would happen if there's any concern about the ability of a sovereign nation to fulfill its debt obligations. And typically that rarely happens. We've seen it happen in a number of occasions, you know, with Greece and a couple of other countries that have gone into some sort of financial meltdown, but it's not something that happens a lot. So the chances that we'll have some of these debt obligations called in on the sodium that will then put our foreign reserves under the kind of pressure that could result in a financial crisis for Nigeria is the chances of that happening are very slim. Talking about confidence in the central bank, the central bank of Nigeria, unfortunately, in my view has tended over the years, especially under the stewardship of the suspended governor, emphasized involvement in areas of the markets and in areas of the economy that perhaps they should have allowed other agencies of government to handle while they focus on monetary policy formulation, monetary policy monitoring and all of that. So in terms of confidence, well, the central bank is the central bank. They represent government that the monetary policy arm of the government. And I don't think that we necessarily have a crisis of confidence with them. I think what we just need to see is the CBN being a bit more broad minded in its approach to how policies are formulated. And I will say that what the central bank needs to do to deal with this crisis that we are headed into very fast is to look at the controls that they have in place and review them. And I think that this needs to happen as a matter of urgency. You know, what we are facing right now is a demand and supply problem. There is simply way more demand in the official markets than there is supply. And there is a difficulty of accessing funds in the official markets, not only as a result of a lack of supply, but also as a result of the stringent measures and policies and, you know, the conditions that you have to meet in order to claim that market. And that is driving people to the parallel markets, which is widening the divergence between the official rates and the parallel market rates, which will eventually push, you know, prices in the parallel market exchange rates in the parallel markets above the $1,000 range very soon. And because a large chunk of our economy still operates in the informal sector and still accesses foreign exchange, much needed foreign exchange that will depend so much on the parallel markets, the impact of that on the rest of the economy, the multiplier effects, the ripple effects and the domino effects, is dangerous. We could be heading into a hyper inflation territory in no time at all if something is not done to shift, to bring in supply into the official markets. And I'm saying that one of the things that the CBN needs to do as a matter of urgency is to review the entire gamut of circular rules and regulations guiding the foreign access and foreign exchange markets in Nigeria from the official authorized dealers. The rules are too many, the controls are too much, they need to be relaxed. Why? So that people that have access to liquidity can bring their money into the country knowing that when they need to take it back out that they will be able to do so. The reasons, one of the reasons that there is a constraint of supply in the foreign exchange market outside of the fact that we probably don't export enough is that the other sources of supply have been stifled and a lot of these players have been pushed into the unofficial markets and the economy as a whole is not benefiting from this. So the CBN needs to look at the issue of exchange controls so that we can attract more money, more supply into the foreign exchange markets. Thank you so much, Mr. Shaguita. Time will not allow us to continue, but I love that you're stopping at the point where you're giving very strong advice to the CBN. Thank you so much for your time today on the breakfast. Thanks for having me. Mr. Shaguita, principal partner Woodridge and Scott Consulting has been my guest on the second hot topic and it's time for us to end the program. And before we leave, I leave you with our quote of the day, science knows no country because knowledge belongs to humanity and is the torch which illuminates the world and that's according to Louis Pasteur. I am Maureen Menon-Wenzigues. Thank you for being a part of the show this morning. Join us tomorrow for another episode.