CBN Denies Overfunding FG

By Dipo Olowookere

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has reacted to a recent report by an online newspaper, Premium Times, that it was over-funding the Federal Government.

Governor of the apex bank, Mr Godwin Emefiele, while addressing newsmen in Abuja after the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting on Tuesday, said “Let me state categorically that the CBN has not over funded the federal government.

“The federal government on its own decided that all its funds, both in local and foreign currency, should be moved to the Central Bank of Nigeria, into the Treasury Single Account.

“It is important to put it in perspective. You as a customer of a central bank or any other bank, and you have fixed deposit in an account and for some reasons you want spontaneous financing to meet your obligation.

“If you approach your bank to allow you to over-withdraw from your account temporarily, your bank will. So this has nothing to do with CBN or any other bank.

“The assurance I will give to you is this, there is no truth in the issue of over funding because whatever is over drawn is far less than what the Federal Government also has in its TSA account.

“So basically all this has to do with the lack of understanding of the operations of the CBN.”