Binance Executives Remain in Detention, Refuse to Name Top Nigerian Users

By Aduragbemi Omiyale

The two executives of Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange platform, detained by the Nigerian government are yet to be released to rejoin their colleagues and families.

About two weeks ago, the Head of Investigations at Binance, Mr Tigran Gambaryan, and the Regional Manager for Africa, Mr Nadeem Anjarwalla, were detained by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) after honouring an invitation from the local authorities.

The government, in a crackdown on foreign exchange (FX) speculators, invited the Binance officials, and when they arrived in the country, it detained them, allegedly requesting they submit the data of its Nigerian users.

According to a report by the Financial Times, the officials have been asked to provide trading data and other information about the top 100 Nigerian users on Binance, but they have refused to grant this request.

This has not gone down well with their interrogators, who are racing behind time, though the government intends to approach the court today to obtain an order to extend their detention beyond 14 days, which ended on Tuesday.

At the moment, the platform has stopped accepting Naira for transactions on its app and has yanked off the currency, as requested by the authorities.

Binance was accused by the Nigerian government of manipulating the Naira to Dollar exchange rate, and one of the media aides of President Bola Tinubu, Mr Bayo Onanuga, had hinted that the company would be fined $10 billion for infractions.

Recall that last month, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr Yemi Cardoso, claimed that in one year, about $26 billion passed through Binance from unidentified persons, hinting that the platform was being used for money laundering.

Since the clampdown on crypto platforms and Bureaux De Change (BDC) operators by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the Naira has maintained stability in the parallel market, attaining convergence on Monday.

Business Post reports that in the official market two days ago, the domestic currency traded at N1,617/$1, while at the parallel market, it was quoted at N1,615/$1.

On Tuesday, it was sold at N1,603/$1 in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM) and N1,602/$1 in the black market.