Presidential spokesman, Femi Adesina has said the Nigeria President Mohammed Buhari will address the nation on Thursday by 7am.
The President’s nationwide broadcast is coming amid wide spread mass reactions and protests to the continuing cash crisis currently being experience by millions of Nigerians across the country in the past few weeks.
However, Adesina, did not categorically state the subject matter the President will be addressing during the broadcast.
In his statement late Wednesday Adesina said,
“President Muhammadu Buhari will make a national broadcast on Thursday, February 16, 2023, at 7 am.
“Television, radio stations, and other electronic media outlets are enjoined to hook up to the network services of the Nigerian Television Authority and Radio Nigeria for the broadcast,”
Earlier in the day, the President had met with the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, hours after the Supreme Court adjourned the suit filed by some governors to challenge the naira redesign policy of the CBN till February 22.
Recall, the President had on February 3 asked Nigerians to give him seven days to look into the issues occasioning the cash crunch and find a lasting solution.
This came after the Nigeria Governors’ Forum pleaded with him to allow all old notes to circulate in the system to ease the hardship on ordinary Nigerians.
Recall, the CBN had initially billed January 31as the official deadline for the swap of old N200, N500, and N1,000 but yielded to pressure and extended the deadline to February 10 following complaints by many Nigerians
To that effect, the CBN had on Tuesday the 14th of February announced that the February 10th deadline remain sacrosanct and that the commercial bank should cease to collect the old notes. The Apex bank maintained that the individuals still in possession of the old notes after the deadline should follow the laid down procedure to return to the central bank.
This is despite the last week Supreme Court order that the Federal Government, the CBN, commercial banks must not continue with the deadline pending the determination of a notice in respect of the issue.
