Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, has urged restive youths across the country to drop their arms and embrace the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP), an agricultural revolution scheme aimed at solving the unemployment and food insufficiency nightmare.
He also announced that the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the apex bank has retained all policy parameters, leaving the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) at 11.5 per cent; asymmetric corridor of +100/-700 basis points around the MPR; the CRR at 27.5 per cent; and Liquidity Ratio at 30 per cent.
Emefiele who made these disclosures at the end of MPC May on Tuesday urged the state governments to repay the $2.1 budget support loan hanging on their necks.
“We will begin to take the money. Be a good debtor. Pay up your debt. If you refuse to pay, you won’t step into that bank again”, he said.
Emefiele reckoned that a nexus exists between food security and national security, urging the Federal Government to make good its promise of solving the insecurity challenge; which has led to a scathing spike in food prices following a drop in crop production and disruption of supply chains.
Emefiele said: “Security challenges and the economy are interconnected. If the economy is to grow, insecurity must be low. If not, the economy will suffer regardless of our efforts. But the chief of defence staff has assured us of security. Some parts of the northwest are saying they are seeing results of military efforts. Efforts now targeted the southeast and southwest.
“Again, the United States and the Federal Government, as a way of boosting security, signed a pact for the supply of 12 Tucano airplanes out of which would help us solve our insecurity. I am aware that six of them are coming to the country in the month of July and August. They are coming. Our brothers should drop their arms and embrace the Anchor Borrowers Programme.”
“I’m optimistic that before the end of the year, this challenge would have abated”.
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