- Police Foil OccupyCBN Protest
The protest that was called by a group known as OccupyCBN was on Friday foiled by the heavy presence of police personnel posted to the headquarters of the Central Bank of Nigeria.
The Federal Capital Territory Police Command had on Wednesday sent a warning to the group, which had threatened to shut down operations at the CBN.
The Public Relations Officer of the command, Manzah Anjuri, had asked the group to call off the action or face the consequences.
He had advised the group to explore legitimate avenues to channel its grievances to the appropriate authorities.
Apparently jolted by the warning from the police, majority of the members of the group backed out of the protest for fear of being arrested.
The Convener of the group, Mr. Deji Adeyanju, told our correspondent that the members had no plan to disrupt the apex bank’s operations but to find out what it was doing to address the challenges of foreign exchange in the country.
“We are not here to cause trouble at the CBN. We are concerned Nigerians and we want to know what deliberate strategies the bank is putting in place to address the crisis in the foreign exchange market,” Adeyanju stated.
Reacting to the development, the Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, CBN, Mr. Isaac Okoroafor, described members of the group as “paid agents of some selfish interest groups and enemies of the Nigerian economy.”
He said, “Some powerful interests want the CBN and the government to reverse the policy on the conservation of foreign exchange and sabotage the ongoing efforts to wean Nigerians from senseless importation.
“These paid agents will fail in their bid to distract the CBN and the Federal Government from their focus on the diversification of the Nigerian economy away from import and crude dependency.”