 Thanks for staying with us now. According to an article on Business Day, the announcement must have come to many people by surprise, but the truth remains that the monetary tool is one of the measures by the Apex Bank to fight corruption, money laundry and related crimes, all of which are obstacles to the effective implementation of the monetary policy in Nigeria. In its simple terms, the move is aimed at reducing the currency in circulation, which was estimated to be about 12.73 trillion Naira, and in the hands of corrupt politicians, illiterate big-time businessmen and women, especially traders most of whom do not bank their funds, as well as those involved in money, laundry and currency round-tripping, using the alternative foreign exchange window popularly called Black Market. Will this new change of currency truly help to curb the level of money politics in the country? And how do you think this would impact the upcoming elections? And that's the question for tonight. Now, please, let's hear what you have to say. Remember, you can join the conversation, send us an SMS or WhatsApp to the read one, 80384663. You can also tweet at us at Weisshoafqa on the hashtag Weissho. So, Elsie, I'm going to bring in Kunle in a minute. I just want to hear your thoughts. What do you think this, I mean, when you heard about the move and how, I mean, a lot of talks all over social media, how this will change, you know, the game for the coming elections, you agree that this will actually be, it will make an impact, it will make a difference? It's been fun on social media. The memes, the conversations, the expectation that, I mean, the currency would have looked a bit better in terms of security features and all that. It's been fun looking at the conversations, but the CBN governor was at an event, I think that was on Friday, that's the 57th annual bankers' dinner, and he made an attempt to explain the reason behind the currency change. He called it repainting, since people have called it recoloring, he jokingly called it repainting, and he was talking about how there is a reason why global standard is you changing it between five to eight years, and we haven't done that in a long time. And I think what was in the bank, in terms of the money that was in circulation, was just about 20%, and that was just a really bad figure. So he gave a lot of explanations and saying that the way it was also announced, people coming out to make it look like they were being ambushed was also for a reason, because if they were going to carry everybody along, they knew that they were going to get a lot of resistance from different quarters corrupt and uncorrupt, right? And then the incorrupt people behind, as he put it, did everything possible to ensure that this was just done smoothly so that we can pass this phase. So it's a lot of tussle for them as well, and he's saying he crunched a lot of numbers and realized that this is what they're supposed to do now. So I'm glad that we're having this conversation because as to how it's going to affect the elections, I honestly do not know from my layman's perspective because even if you're saying maybe the politicians have money stashed off somewhere, right? Quote and unquote, I believe that most of them are all corrupt anyway, they will still find a way to get their stash changed. So I would just like to hear what Kuley has to say. We'll think about this and what this would impact the, and also talk about the vandalism around INEC offices, right? Kuley Lawal, thank you. So he is an entrepreneur. He is the politician and the patriot. He was one of, he was once the national secretary of Kowa Party and the Alliance for New Nigeria, FCT Senatorial Candidate in 2019. He is very passionate about Nigeria and he's a friend of the house. He's joining us live from Abuja. Thank you so much, Kuley, for joining us tonight. Thank you very much, Ua and LC, and it's always a pleasure to be on the way. All right, so I mean, you've heard the conversation. I mean, this is the lot that is going on. We're trying to unpack what this is, what this means to us as a people. So on the streets rather, a lot of people are saying that this Naira rebranding would help, you know, the 2023 elections because again, we know that politics in Nigeria is really, really tied around money politics, where politicians begin to throw money up and down, right? So will this really impact, will it change anything? Because again, his small caveat is that a lot of politicians, the last, what's it called, primaries they did, it was dollars they were sharing, it was in Naira. So I don't even know how this, we don't even know. So I don't know how this, but please help us break it down. What is the impact of this rebranding on our elections that is coming in 2023? Thank you very much. And it's a case of, you know, a lot of us trying to explain, you know, what I think is inexplainable. So I'd first like to start on the, you know, a brief background. To reprint the old Naira, 53.6 billion is needed to print 2.5 billion Naira. This was as of last year. And this was from CBN. So to redesign, repaint, or whatever it's being called right now. The figures are not clear. And, you know, with the present statistics, statistics according to the evaluation of the Naira that's falling drastically, most argue that this is not the time to do it. But the federal government leads that necessarily it needs to be done. World standards need to be met. It could help with security. And in some quarters, it's actually being communicated that an adjustment in Naira will help abate corruption in politics. I really don't see how this happens. And if you look at Nigeria's history of elections, yes, Naira has been used preceding 2019. But with 2023, politicians have moved into they were in gear four before they I think they've gone up to gear 10. Right now with the primaries as who are right there, it's it's transactions are made in dollars. And if you're referring to security, maybe guaranteeing security against kidnapping, terrorists, and et cetera, those also receive money in dollars to not Naira and some even Bitcoin as it is. So I don't understand the security implication as propounded by the government on why this decision was taken. And now we place the background, let's move into the story. So as regards elections, I'll tell you the truth. And the redesign of Naira, yes, will cause a little fracas here and there. Politicians were preparing, but I'll be honest with you, there's a deadline, there's a deadline for the Naira notes, which I believe is sometime in January. And that's preceding the the inducements that would happen in when the presidential election occurred first February, and then following March 11th for the gopnotorial. And this is us being this is being honest and candid about the real situation Nigeria has to deal with. Politicians do not move money exactly in cash initially. Right now what they do is mop up, store the money in banks or preferably with the way Naira is dropping, it's best to keep the money in dollars. And I'm not saying I'm not a corrupt politician, but I'm trying to think like one. So if you're going to keep the money is best to keep it in dollars so that just before February, you can change those dollars to Naira. So you have quite a lot more to dispense into what we will call campaign inducements. So I don't think it has any factor or it has any abating or margins to the kind of corruption that will be seen in 2023 elections. Okay, you have a question, right? I was going to even bring him back. So before we go deep into this conversation to just touch on the what's in the news you took on the vandalization rather of some of the INEC properties. How do you think that would also affect because the INEC chairman has come out to say that they can recover. But this is still worrisome because we have less than three months to the election. So how do you think this is going to play out? Do you think we'll see more of these bad state actors going on and on? Being honest about it, I will say finding it very shocking that people attempt to do this. I also find it most astounding that we've decided to play politics right straight out of the gutter of the non-invented prison which Nigeria has always operated as regards politics. INEC will of course be faced with the first challenge which means it will probably cost it more to execute these elections. Let's quickly remember that in 2019 elections and its impact issues cost us close to a billion or about a billion dollars in 2019. If that same amount is the amount projected to be spent, the effect of these actors on INEC agencies and offices will become quite a massive increase to the amount of money INEC would use to execute these elections. Now this for me is not only surprising but let's also remember that Nigeria's security level is at its poorest right now. If I were to sit in the INEC chairman's seat right now I would actually be looking at its target elections. Because let's look at it, Nigeria has about to give or take 500,000 policemen and about 200 and something thousand soldiers. It doesn't mean we can secure this country as we would love to secure this country. So I will think, I don't want to discuss the problems or I'll move to the solution. So I think we should have a staggered elections maybe presidential in three states so that the security there is enough to handle anything then you do another four states then depending on how they deem it fit or maybe six states over the course of three or four days. I think this will help INEC also recover fully and prepare itself for the worst. Nigeria is actually at its worst security situation it's ever been in its history and I think some proactive measures need to be taken to safeguard not only the elections but also the people voting. Okay Kuli, I was just going to tie this question back into the molly policies that we're talking about. If you are recommending a staggered election would that not also be much more expensive right for the people that are because now is a different thing if it is just one day but if it's staggered it means that the expenses will go higher and we're trying to curb remember we're trying to bring down the cost of elections right that people have to spend so much you know just to get the process out of the way you know would this not be more expensive for the people that are involved in the elections? I won't say make it easy. I'll go ahead Elsteen. No I was asking would that also make rigging easier? No it wouldn't I don't think so. The truth is that with the electoral act we already have a ceiling on campaign funds this has not been attended to and hence all the problems all the money all the mention of more money being spent the truth is like for example no presidential candidates can spend more than five billion naira and I can tell you average the whether donated or not donated or from whatever money that was kept some when someone was a governor or someone was a vice president. I feel almost of them have exceeded five billion because this includes cost of jets moving around money they've given to flood victims money they used during primaries they've exceeded campaign ceiling and if you've done that that means you're already against the position campaigns or campaigns are not necessarily supposed to be about money but that's what it is here and we've translated it and started even caring for the money being spent but that for me is totally wrong against the law also and also infringing on the Nigerian electoral act 2022. Okay but I need to clarify that part right so when you said the spending limits for campaign doesn't it start counting from when the campaign starts are you saying it starts from the activities of the political party even through the primaries and all through the election is that what you're saying now? Okay you know it's kind of hard because if you look at the electoral act 2022 it doesn't clearly state where it starts from but as in other climes to follow what's being done in other climes it starts from the day you declare which means walking you through the primaries walking you through post primaries the entire system five billion naira for me is more than enough it's a waste totally for me to for anybody to run for president and if we have not curbed this we will continue to have politics and voters based on inducements we're encouraging the same system that cannot produce a fully representative government that is of the people and by the people without campaigning inducements. Let's go on a very short break right when we come back from the break we'll continue this conversation stay with us we'll be right back. Alright thanks for staying with us now if you just tuned in we're discussing the topic naira we're designing and we're asking what the impact on the elections will be and we have with us now remember you can join the conversation send us an sms or whatsapp to the raid one 803-4663 you can also do that as a hashtag we show we really love to hear what you have to say about this. Alright so KL right um it's so interesting when you say from where you where you declare some people between that declaration and primaries that five billion is already gone i can assure you that you know so i'm now wondering um if we truly want to let's just go by what the CBN governor is saying that they want to curb corrupt politicians they want to curb um what's it called um money laundry let's even focus on the one that is really really tied to the elections money laundry and corrupt politicians right um and again there are some level of security measures with the new notes so i'm hearing that it's traceable and all of that let us just say that come 2023 day of elections and all of that run us through how this money is being transferred because i mean i heard a very shocking story of one of one person that ran for a particular office it was overnight you know the ganamos go was moving overnight like he almost lost that elections right he had to look for money like that dying minutes to get money to go and counter what his opponent had paid for you know so i mean it's just a messy thing right so maybe help us walk us through that process i want to even understand how does this money even exchange hand and what's the process like are you there okay you're go ahead i'm here i'm here so you're asking me the abc of campaign inducements in nigeria if i'm right yes help me and it's quite it's quite interesting so um if you're going to walk through from declaration the first set of money gets lost when you declare because you must declare with a set of things when you declare to the party you must also have done some things i can tell you that this is as easy as maybe painting parts of these ward secretaries depending on how high you're running redesigning a few offices just to show your commitment and your hard work in nature to the party you start spending um you don't move to talking to the elders you must leave envelopes you move to that you get to try to secure against other aspirants you are moving envelopes you get to securing your ticket you won your presented the copy the campaign flag trust me envelopes will go out also after you've won once that goes on i will tell you so i'll even give so you know i find interesting when the media likes to act like they are not a part of the system and you know they're always criticizing and the moment you become a candidate and i've been one so i understand what the media so normal media like right now i'm not accusing ways but let's use ways for an example since i'm on ways ways naturally would love to have cune laual on the show and cune laual would come on the show and have fun but the moment cune becomes a candidate and cune wants to voice out maybe what he has to say even though the electoral act fully states that the media must give every candidate when he gives one a chance that's across the 18 parties but what happens now is that the media will now start asking for their own envelopes it goes up and keeps growing up media websites when you're getting towards election the royal fathers that you're going to meet across who are within your campaign jurisdiction will ask for something people who are going to blog will ask for something now the trick is three days before election and i didn't know this till i ran for office three days before elections is when the real money is when even the numbers the people who you think are probably going to win the elections the the altar within those three days because within three days i'll take politicians making ring i can tell you that even though you've been putting into your your your ward or your constituency or your state or nigeria what will happen three days before election is that everything you've done is wiped because somebody will come with a clean slate and say i have this to give i have this to give i have this to give and funny enough the average nigerian demands it we've learned to demand from our candidates so the real money really goes out really within the last three days of elections to elections sorry than any other time what happens on election day is probably little baby handouts but you know there's what we call the gatekeepers in politics you have to whether you're running a state you're running a constituency in a ward in a local government the gatekeepers have to be taken care of and those gatekeepers are what she calls the money down so it depends if i'm running for president now i have a gatekeeper for let's say lego state and that gatekeeper in lego state has a gate has gatekeepers for other local government so i feed the lego state gatekeeper he feeds the local government gatekeepers who feed the the the constituency gatekeepers who feed the the ward gatekeepers the ward is the smallest political unit which has guns which feeds the listen so it's a whole it's a whole um it's a whole um how would i put it parasitic establishment i think that would be the best way to put it and a lot of money gets lost within the system i'll give you an example just to rough the example to close now if you're going to run for president nigeria has about 177 thousand i think 680 polling units as a candidate if you're running for president you're going to have at least two polling agents per unit let's use 170 000 as our multiplication bar so you have and you're going to give each of them as of 2019 you average they give a polling agent 5000 so two polling agents that's 10 000 multiplied by 170 000 you have 1.7 billion naira just for you to spend as a presidential candidate on election day you're not this not campaign inducements you just make ensuring people guard and ensure them or put an eye on your votes and ensure that at every polling unit you are being guarded okay so you mentioned a few groups of people now you mentioned the gatekeepers media royal fathers or what did they call them the electorate and then the politician himself or herself who was run for office and we are all in this mess and of course the electorate as well that's how the money keeps moving so in your own opinion and what you have seen on ground with the work you do with the college right if there is going to be true change of this whole people this group of people you've mentioned system where do you think it has to start from okay um you cannot you cannot um demand greatness if you've not started to look towards meritocracy so um as much as we blame the politicians politicians are less than a fraction of less than 0.25 the entire politics the politicians in Nigeria are less than 0.25 percent of Nigerians and type of nation so if the people actually didn't say we don't want money finally that's what's going to happen i can tell you that a lot of candidates running right now if they weren't funding or feeding some let's use the word parasite you won't have anybody campaigning for them but because we have become a buffet of corruption when it comes to elections we naturally think and it's it's become a culture in Nigeria we believe once somebody is a politician he must give something to us we need to kill that first for me the entire power to change this like as in the electorate we have the loss to back it already i'll give you an example so even looking at even governance i'll give you a very simple example you have like let's take for instance etiosa which is where you are etiosa the local government chairman does not have immunity which means he can be he can sue and be sued and if he's found guilty he will go to jail whether he's sitting on seat or not etiosa's federal government allocation as of 2019 was over 483 million per month the electorate has never criticized this it never asked anything of it they don't care because it's not their business as long as the local government chairman puts up a good face gives them a few things does a few noise making it is fine so we actually have turned our politics the culture of our politics is corruption so till the electorate goes out of this we're never getting out of it so this is really scary because i was going to still ask that you know the impact because again everybody's trying to almost look like okay i'm trying to do something um like worthy right everybody's praising the president that this is a good move this is this is that i mean he's showing that yes he really wants to you know clamp down on politicians especially that are focused on money and pushing money and putting money in the faces of the electorate and all of that so people are finding it easy to just quickly whip sentiments to say oh yes it's a worthy cause because again i say in Nigeria people just like it make their bill like say will they do something that's how i see it right it's not really like so that's why it was important for us to have this conversation if this was even impactful at all is even helpful at all but from what you're what you're saying what i'm hearing you say i don't see any um help that this will do you know in terms of the 2023 elections right so i mean there's there's no there's zero no impact right i mean there's little no impact for these coming elections that's what i'm hearing you say right confirm to me that that's what i'm saying but i also like to cast your mind back to you know a few tricks of the of the of the monetary system i don't want to call any particular agency or anything but a few tricks of money system um earlier in this administration i remember when we were being told that um we're striking a deal with china and the yen and there's going to be a change and you know this is going to help grow the value of naira um i'd like to ask um what's going on with that just the thought it's the same way this naira design kind of sounds funny at the time you know what's most funny is that we're not even being told how much was used to do to achieve the present um filtering sorry i meant painting sorry what's the word for the new coloration of naira so um no we're not being told how much but last figures we have for for printing on it's everywhere across the world is expensive to print money because of the security features so like i stated earlier in the program 58.6 billion to print 2.5 billion now if you're going to give it a makeover or a facelift you should imagine how much it will cost i also do not think that they have come us themselves to say that they're doing this because of politicians and um these these are just um opinions and what people are suggesting that this is why they say they are doing it but if you read up whatever they have put out which of course i also blame them for their communication problem um i don't think they've ever come out to say oh we're doing this because we want to call to turn to corruption uh corrupt politicians what's the call money laundry what i mean is happening everywhere or or not and i know it's happening all the constants you know so i i don't think they've also come out to say this is why we are doing this and ever mention the 2023 elections you know what i know they would point fingers on to themselves absolutely let's let's wrap this conversation kule if you had something to say right um what would you be counseling um especially the electorate because again now at this point it's not so much of the politicians it's more of us that are the voters right you know how do we approach the 2022 in three elections you know because again we cannot deny that money must change hands like there will be money the politicians will make it rain there's a bit of desperation or they will make it rain trust me so and there's a lot of desperation with this particular elections right and that's why you see all the vandalization going on in different local governments and all of that so much intimidation trying to happen and all of that so a lot will happen so what would you say to the electorates well um what i'll be looking at saying to everyone is that number one politics is not emotional so keep your emotions out of it that's the first thing secondly if you're going to make a decision knowing you can jackpot or whatever you're going to jackpot and leave some people here whether it's your dad your mom your siblings your cousins nigeria doesn't have an excuse not to be a great country with about 5.4 percent of the world's entire natural resources with abin the most populous black nation the intelligence here with nigeria does not have an excuse so we need to start going to the nitty gritty the simple figures what exactly is going to be done and i'll put forward something just for the minds of everyone there are 18 presidential candidates do you know not one of them has discussed what he's going to do with an inherited half-budget everybody has been talking about great things they are going to do but they've forgotten that they will start with a half-budget come june 2023 start to ask the real questions not what are you going to give us about education or how are you going to make gdp or why are you so good at being president those are not the real questions i would like to hear one of the presidential candidates come out and say something and the most powerful arm of governance in a democracy is the senate please don't be so i focused on the senate and the candy is being stolen out to from you at the national assembly or at state parts of assembly or local government thank you very much it was pleasure having this conversation thank you so let's just quickly take a comment i believe yeah so this is good evening my dear bitwister so what are you saying um so on the topic whether it creates any part on the elections or not it's not the issue we have other person issues in Nigeria we're talking about we designed the currency do we really need this is this moving necessary i really don't understand i have really missed the show for the past one week thank you thank god that is back sister while you're welcome back it's been a while thank you thank you danie lilo let me just be telling you ahead of time that we're going to go on another break we're going on our our year end break we'll resume but but after this week though but else i mean if you had one thing to say what would you say because we still have a few minutes that's one thing from what school is said which is that we should take emotions aside i know that for many it is difficult for them to read between the lines and really understand things for themselves and that is what i really want people to be keen to do um beyond the frenzy on social media beyond the headlines and look for the information i i would be the first to always say that this government has not done well in terms of communication even with the the event i i mentioned on friday right the only communication i've seen online about that was the noise um and just the picking the the online picking that um insta blog did on social media and the people of course that had over 5 000 comments and people were saying also so it's good to i i think the government need to do better in terms of communication and we also need to look for that information to know imagine what he said about the amounts that goes to local government chairman that's a lot of money do we even ask the question like what are you doing with this money is what what is the project that you have done the person that is there now is going to be gone in a few in a few weeks right they've collected that money for how many months what is the impact to eight years of local government what have we seen right so these are the questions that are important and he said something about um half budget from last year i think that goes back to those who are also arranging the whole um debate right if you're arranging these debates ask the right questions not because you think this is the time oh you have the name already you have the platform let's just bring them and talk and i'll take it off to say i'm part of those who have interviewed the the the presidential candidates let's let's just do the work that we are supposed to do up for ourselves and maybe from within we can begin to change the country but if we just keep talking folding our hands and following the noise then we'll probably be well we are for a very long time okay i think we have another comment or comment yeah okay i was just going to say to kuley you know even speaking to this thing you just said the ocean state governor you know you you are on your way out kuley you are on your way out and you are appointing is that not fraud you know like why do we keep condoning these things and can we not even begin to check some of these things that these politicians do like are they immune you know to to some to some kind of things right you are on your way out and you are appointing people i'm wondering why so the check the check of a of a state governor is state house of assembly when we don't care who's been appointed into who's been elected into the state house of assembly you have a state as state house of assembly has been pocketed by a governor and local government chairman pocketed on the other side you cannot have it's on our system you have a governor of river state appointing over a hundred thousand special assistants that that he should he actually should be impeached but you know we just the political arguments and we think some things are true we just need to begin to ask and i i i think we're coming up with one of the debates for the electoral college hopefully you know quickly i think this was it from some hours ago three hours ago um i delicate sacks 12 000 ocean workers after inauguration and dethrones um or shumon actually or shumon yeah well we're gonna do with that i think this is going to be very interesting week and delicate is ready for them it's winter to me we designed naira notes is shadow chasing instead of resuscitation the value of the naira you are spending billions to reprint all the reason poised by the cbn are just on paper your guest has made the point where telecom network not shut down in some of the north to track kidnappers in the past did it work no i foresee it as a trap for the opposition as they would be closely monitored about movement of cash back those transactions will be opened for the actors in the ruling party however one advantage is that by january dollar will drop well well because the politicians will sell off the dollar for naira because no politician will part with hundred dollar bills to a voter right that he will change it to naira to go around and about five and give go around five voters thank you austin from delta state thank you so much guys i mean we've missed you too so before we go ensure thank you kulela well thank you lc before we go and show you follow us all over social medias that way show africa you can interact with us further drop a comment or more importantly follow all our engagements on social media like share and invite your families and friends to watch and follow the conversation now if you missed our quote for today here it is again the realistic way to reduce the amount of money in politics is to reduce the amount of politics in money the importance of government in allocating wealth and opportunity all right we'll see you guys again tomorrow at 8 p.m so bring another great conversation to your screen enjoy