The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said strict adherence to the implementation of policy guidelines on cashless economy will help achieve its purpose.

CBN Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, said this in an interactive forum on Electronic Payment Systems organised by E-Payment Providers Association of Nigeria, (E-PPAN) in Abuja.

He was represented by the Director, Banking and Payment System Department, Mr. Dipo Fatokun.

According to the CBN Governor, the apex bank had already released guidelines on Point of Sale (POS); regulatory framework for mobile payments; cheque truncation; ATM fraud prevention; migration to electronic magnetic valve cards, and establishment of policy and oversight office, but insisted that these policy guidelines must be strictly adhered to, if Nigeria must achieve the CBN initiative on cashless economy.

Sanusi said the Nigerian economy was too heavily cash-oriented in transactions of goods and services, which negated global trends and might hamper Nigeria's ambition to be among the top 20 economies of the world by the year 2020.

He explained that about 65 per cent of cash in circulation in the country was outside of the banking system and were severely limiting the impact of CBN's effort at price and economic stabilisation.

In a paper titled: ‘Getting Government Closer to the People Through Cashless Initiative’, Director Payment Solutions and Value Added Service (VAS) for Interswitch, Mr. Charles Ifedi, said the current attempt by CBN to entrench cashless transaction structure in the country was a laudable initiative that could easily place Nigeria among the 20 world economies on or before the year 2020.

He however warned that the initiative might suffer setback if past mistakes of government were not adequately addressed and corrected. According to him, “several failed attempts at entrenching e-government initiatives like the National ID card project created some form of mistrust among the people, for lack of proper implementation of the project.”

Ifedi berated the insufficient and low presence of E-Payment Channels at various service points such as the hospitals, motor parks, and other centres.
In another presentation titled: “FGN e-payment Adoption: The Story so far”, the Group Head, Remita Services, SystemSpecs Limited, Mr. Demola Igbalajobi said the federal government through the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) had committed to implementing a Treasury Single Account as part of the economic reform programme.

This, he said, included the implementation of an Enterprise Financial Management System (GIFMIS) to be integrated with a robust e-Payment system, describing the event as an important opportunity for a synergy among major institutions in the financial sector.

http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/policy-implementation-key-to-cashless-economy/122990/