CBN ​lifts forex ban on 8 banks after agreement to refund billions of dollars

The Central Bank of Nigeria on Wednesday re-instated the eight banks banned last week from operating in the country’s foreign exchange market.

The CBN Director, Banking Supervision Department, Tokunbo Martins, announced the reinstatement of the banks, after a meeting between chief executive officers of the affected banks and the Committee of Governors of the CBN under the auspices of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN).

Mrs. Martins said the decision was taken after the CEOs presented an acceptable plan to repay all the outstanding dollars in respect of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)/Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) deposits in their possession to the Treasury Single Account (TSA).

“We have had engagements with the body of CEOs over a number of banks suspended from participation in foreign exchange market. I’m happy to say the ban has been lifted on the banks. As a result, all those banks have been reinstated into foreign exchange market,” Mrs. Martins said

Managing Director of Access Bank Plc, Herbert Wigwe, who spoke on behalf of the affected banks’ CEOs, said the banks pledged to uphold the re-payment plan.

Last week,the CBN suspended nine commercial banks from further dealing in foreign exchange transactions in the country over infractions on its directives on the TSA remittances.

The banks were found guilty of refusing to remit to the TSA over $2.12 billion revenue realised from the operations of the NNPC.

The United Bank for Africa (UBA) was later re-admitted to the market after it refunded over $530 million unremitted NNPC/NLNG FOREX deposits in its possession.

Those unbanned on Wednesday are First Bank of Nigeria (FBN) ($469 million); Diamond Bank Plc ($287 million); Sterling Bank Plc ($269 million); Skye Bank Plc ($221 million); Fidelity Bank ($209 million); Keystone Bank ($139 million); First City Monument Bank {FCMB} ($125 million) and Heritage Bank ($85 million).

The continued banning of the eight banks was said to have been responsible for the continued dip in value of the Naira against the dollar and other international currencies last week.

PREMIUM TIMES confirmed that the nine commercial banks also failed to remit crude oil sales revenues from oil blocks operated by the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) and its joint venture (JV) partners.

The NPDC is the upstream oil industry subsidiary of the NNPC.

Some of the oil blocks included oil mining leases (OMLs) previously vacated by Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC, included eight whose ownership were irregularly approved by the immediate past Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke.

They included OMLs 4, 38 and 41 allocated to Atlantic Energy and Septa Energy; OML 42 to Neconde Energy and Kulcyzk Oil; OML 40 to Elcrest E&P Nigeria Limited and Band Oil and Gas; OML 34 to Niger Delta Western and Petrolin; OML 30 to Shoreline and Heritage Oil, and OML 26 to First Hydrocarbon Nigeria and Afren.