The Association of National Accountants of Nigeria has said that the planned introduction of N5,000 note by the Central Bank of Nigeria will not increase the level of inflation in the country.

The President of the body, Hajia Maryam Ladi-Ibrahim said this in a statement on Tuesday.

She said, “Looking at it from the macro-economic aspect of it, it will not for now produce outright increase in inflation.”

She, however, explained that in the long run, the effects would depend on the implementation of the policy by the apex bank.

According to her, somebody earning N50,000 will still collect the same amount.

She said restructuring of currency denomination had always been a common thing to nations, stressing that it had been a practice with the apex banks of countries for restructuring purposes.

She said, “In doing this, they consider the advantages and disadvantages. In the current case, we thought it was going to be something from N1,000 to N2,000.

Listening to the CBN, the bank considered the cost saving effect (the cost of production of the note), and I think that was why our President and his economic coordinating team approved that.”

She, nevertheless, advised that the government should make more available the smaller denominations of naira notes to be in circulation because of its implication for the poor and the lowly paid.

“In all sectors, you have people doing menial jobs and they are paid very little amount. If you give them a single note of N5,000, they still need to go and break it down to make purchases,” she said. Ladi-Ibrahim, a former Auditor-General of Kogi State, said that in this regard the CBN should make available more of the lower denominations.

She said, “The quality of our currency must be of international standard and I think that is what is making the cost of production very high. We have to follow the international best practices in currency production and we must maintain that international standards are respected.”

Source: Punch