Banks Under Lock Despite 200 Dispensation Directive

Fatihat Olayitan

Despite the new directive on the issuance of naira notes announced in a nationwide broadcast by President Muhammadu, transactions are yet to commence at many commercial banks in Kwara State.

Many residents from the hinterland who had travelled to the city centre to carry out transactions in the banks were met with locked gates and non-dispensing ATMs.

The correspondent, who visited some of the banks, reports that most of the banks were under lock however, ATMs of Polaris, Eco and Access banks were dispensing cash as customers were able to withdraw five thousand naira each.

Some of the commercial bank customers who spoke with Radio Nigeria in Ilorin described the bank management as being insensitive to the plight of the people.

They questioned the rationale behind the closure of banks and empty Automated Teller Machines, ATMs despite the Federal Government’s directive that the people could be issued the old two hundred notes alongside the new naira notes of two hundred, five hundred and one thousand.

At the banks visited, residents who were seen in queues trying to access the ATM urged the Central Bank of Nigeria to sanction any commercial banks which fail to adhere to the new directives issued by President Muhammadu Buhari.