Two bank managers have been arrested in Osogbo by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, ICPC, over their failure to load their bank’s ATM s with the new naira notes.
Their arrest came barely 48hours after Godwin Emefiele, the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN Governor said the apex bank was working with security agencies to deal with bank officials trying to frustrate it’s efforts to make the new Banknotes available to the public, following outrage that the currency was being deliberately hoarded by top bank some unscrupulous banks’ officials.
On Friday, President Muhammadu Buhari also accused some banks of deliberately working against CBN, during his meeting with 36 state governors in Abuja.
In a statement on Friday by Azuka Ogugua, the ICPC spokesperson, the commission said the cash bundles were loaded into the ATMs while still wrapped, and as such, could not be dispensed through the machines.
“The ICPC Compliance Team in Osogbo has busted an FCMB in Osogbo, Osun State, where some ATMs were loaded with cash with their wrappers un-removed, thus preventing the cash from being dispensed,” the statement reads.
“The Team therefore directed that the wrappers be removed, and the cash loaded properly.
“However, when a follow-up visit was undertaken the following day to ascertain the level of compliance, the Team discovered that one of the ATMs was still loaded with the wrappers un-removed. The Operation Manager of the Bank was arrested and taken in for questioning.”
The commission said the branch service head of Stanbic IBTC Bank in Deidei, Abuja, was taken into custody over the “deliberate refusal to upload cash into the branch’s Automated Teller Machines (ATM) even when the cash was available, and people were queuing at the ATMs”.
“When the ICPC monitoring team stormed the bank at about 1:30pm to ensure compliance, and demanded explanation as to why all the ATMs were not dispensing cash, it was informed by the branch’s Head of Operations that the bank just got delivery of the cash,” the commission said.
“However, facts available to the ICPC operatives indicated that the branch took delivery of the cash around 11:58am and either willfully or maliciously refused to feed the ATMs with the cash.
“Against this backdrop, the ICPC team compelled the bank to load the ATMs with the redesigned Naira notes and ensured that they were all dispensing before arresting the culprit.
“Investigations are still ongoing, and the Commission will take appropriate actions as soon they are concluded.”
Seven Point of Sale (POS) operators and a security guard were also said to have been arrested in Osun state over alleged extortion of residents.
The ICPC said a probe into the activities of the POS operators revealed that they got the cash from filling stations, “but they then resell the cash to the public at exorbitant rates”.
“The arrested persons are helping the Commission with information to assist investigations and bust any syndicates involved in the hoarding or sales of the redesigned notes,” ICPC added.
President Buhari during his meeting with governors today, begged Nigerians to give him seven days to resolve the naira crisis.
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