Buhari apologises for hardship caused by currency redesign after Supreme Courts rules old notes legal until December

NIGERIA'S Supreme Court has ordered that all old naira notes must remain in circulation alongside the news one until December 31 this year ruling that anyone refusing to take them is acting illegally.

In a landmark ruling this morning, the Supreme Court ordered the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to allow both sets of notes and to circulate side by side until the end of the year. Its ruling meant that all directives issued by President Muhammadu Buhari in respect of the naira re-designing and circulation were voided and set aside on grounds of illegalities and abuse of executive powers.

Also the court took a swipe at President Buhari for disobeying its interim order of February 8 to the effect that the old naira is allowed to be in circulation. Justice Emmanuel Akomaye Agim held that the president exhibited and took the disobedience to the highest peak with his broadcast of February 16 in which he allowed only N200 notes alone.

Responding to the judgement, Mallam Salihu Lukman, the All Progressives Congress' national vice chairman, northwest, called for the resignation of the CBN governor Godwin Emefiele and the attorney-general of the federation, Abubakar Malami. He accused them of misleading President Buhari to flout the Supreme Court order on the new naira redesign policy.

President Buhari (has apologised to Nigerians over the cash crunch caused by the naira redesign policy of the federal government. He added that the naira redesign policy was never meant to cause untold hardship to Nigerians.

“I apologise to you for the hardship caused by the change of the Naira. It was done to boost the economy of the country, not to cause hardship to anybody," President Buhari added.

Meanwhile, talks are in progress for an alliance between the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the Labour Party to wrestle power in Kaduna State. Felix Hyet, the PDP chairman in Kaduna State and former aviation minister, has called on the people of the state to unite and chase out the APC government by voting for the PDP governorship candidate, Isa Ashiru.