Former President of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Mr. Peter Obi, has called on the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to re-consider its recent monetary policies, especially those whose adverse effects outweighed their positive impacts.
Obi said while interacting with newsmen in Awka, Monday that he, however, appreciated the motives behind some of the regulations.
He said that the issue of domiciliary account needed to be re-considered as it was hurting the economy due to its effects on small and medium scale businesses, which formed the biggest employers of labour in the country.
Obi, also the immediate past governor of Anambra State, said that any policy not favourable to small and medium scale businesses both in short and long terms should be re-examined, especially now that one of the biggest challenges of Nigeria was unemployment.
He said, “Those small and medium businesses are pivotal to the fight against extreme poverty.”
Obi said that a survey of small and medium scale businesses in areas such as Onitsha, Nnewi, Aba, Lagos and other trading cities would show that traders were suffering.
He said that the unintended negative impacts of the policy dwarfed its positive effects.
He, therefore, advised the CBN to commission a study, to obtain the realities on ground and possibly review the situation.
