Some residents of Gombe in Gombe State have commended the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) over its cash swap programme.
It will be recalled that the apex bank on Monday unveiled cash swap programme in rural areas, as part of its plans to phase out the old naira notes.
The programme is being implemented in partnership with super agents and Deposit Money Banks (DMBs).
A cross section of the residents, who spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Thursday in Gombe and adjourning communities, said the initiative had eased difficulties in accessing the redesigbed naira notes.
They said that it also enabled the citizens, especially rural dwellers and those with limited access to formal financial services to exchange old naira notes for redesigned notes.
One of the residents, Hanatu Audu said the deployment of commercial bank agents and CBN official monitors would improve wellbeing of the people and enhance financial inclusion.
Audu said that she made frantic efforts to change N5,000 old notes at different banks in the past three days, adding that “I now have the newly redesigned naira notes in less five minutes”.
She, however, expressed concern over shortage of the redesigned N200 notes which made transactions difficult in communities.
Another resident, Halima Musa said that the initiative would deal with queues of customers which made deposit of old naira notes difficult in the banks.
Usman, who expressed joy over the programme, said: “I am very happy that I swapped my N10,000 old notes with the new ones.
“I commend the CBN for bringing their agents to our door steps to give us the new notes. It is hard to get in the banks”.
She appealed to the apex bank to issue more N200 new notes and other smaller denominations, to make it available and ease businesses transaction.
Corroborating earlier opinion, Mr Uche Victor and Ibrahim Gombe said that circulation of the smaller denominations would address transaction challenges and boost commercial activities in the society.
They also advocated for more swap centres to enable the people to change the old naira notes before the Jan. 31 deadline.
