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- Pix(above, R-L): CBN Gov Emefiele, redesigned naira notes and PMB
The embattled Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, on Thursday, met with President Muhammadu Buhari at the State House, Abuja, amidst ceaseless harassment by the Department of State Services (DSS). This is Emefiele’s second meeting with the president since he returned to the country earlier this month.
Although details of their discussions were not made public, highly competent sources said it might not be unconnected with the need to proffer political solution to the DSS’ avowed determination to rein him in on allegations of terrorism financing and economic crimes.
Emefiele was also said to have used the opportunity to brief the president, first hand, on the true state of the economy, especially since he began a far-reaching economic reform regarding cashless policy, cash withdrawal limit policy, naira redesign, among others.
Recall that while Emefiele was on his annual vacation abroad, the DSS approached a Federal High Court, Abuja, seeking a warrant to arrest and detain him over terrorism financing and economic crimes charges. But the presiding judge, Justice JT Tsoho, turned it down, asking it to provide more convincing evidence, failure which it shall rely on its own judgment, saying: “if the DSS believes the evidence available to it is so sufficient, it should go ahead to arrest and detain the defendant, even without waiting for order of the court.”
On Emefiele’s resumption from his leave, January 16, a horde of DSS operatives swarmed around him, fuelling suspicion he was under arrest.
But when the news of Emefiele’s arrest hit town, the secret service, through its PRO, Dr Peter Afunanya, quickly refuted it, regarding it as fake news.
Perhaps the most worrisome aspect of the DSS saga that prompted Emefiele’s immediate appointment with the president was the purported instruction of the secret police to its men by its top hierarchy to be on-the-lookout for Governor Godwin Emefiele, according to a report of the Peoples Gazette on Saturday, December 24, 2022.
Due to the directives, the domestic intelligence office has deployed several officers to monitor the CBN Headquarters, Emefiele’s family residence in Lagos, and the Abuja home of a businessman, Christopher Emefiele, unrelated by blood.
Some of this will form the crux of Emefiele’s discussions with the president, said our source.
Earlier on Thursday, the embattled CBN chief was part of a delegation of the Arab Bank for Economic Development led by its Director General (DG), Dr Sidi Ould Tah./SHARE THIS