By Toby TAIWO
.First time since January 2009
The Nigerian Presidency is making the most of the record Foreign Exchange Reserve, which hit $51.03 billion on Thursday, the highest since January 2009.
Special Adviser on Information and Strategy to President Bola Tinubu, Bayo Onanuga, took to his X handle to taunt presidential candidates Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi.
He wrote: Atiku and Obi don’t want to hear the good news of Nigeria’s improved foreign reserve. As far as they are concerned, President Tinubu has accomplished nothing since taking office. Yet stubborn facts of the administration’s solid achievement keep hitting them in the face”
Nigeria’s foreign exchange (FX) reserves rose to $51.03 billion on Thursday, the highest level since January 20, 2009, according to data obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The figure also represents the highest since the beginning of the year, under Olayemi Cardoso, governor of CBN’s administration.
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On January 20, 2009, the FX reserves was $51.07 billion.
The data showed that the foreign reserves increased steadily by 3.76 percent or $1.85 billion, from $49.18 billion reported on April 1, the start of the second quarter (Q2), to $51.03 billion on June 18.
Before this, Nigeria’s external reserves crossed the $50 billion threshold on March 10, when it stood at $50.01 billion, and continued to rise in subsequent months, reaching $50.11 billion on June 5 before climbing above $51 billion
The increase followed a review of payment methods of the international money transfer operators (IMTOs) in March.
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CBN directed all IMTOs to open naira settlement accounts and route all remittance transactions through them, resulting in recipients of diaspora remittances receiving payments in the local currency from May.
The directive ended decades of dollar payments to Nigerians when relatives abroad send money home.
CBN said the directive is part of ongoing efforts to strengthen the remittance framework introduced in its revised guidelines for international money transfer services issued in January 2024.
