In preparation for the expected increase in electronic banking transactions, the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, said Monday that it would quickly conduct an audit of the nation’s payment system.
Bank clients had difficulties and widespread transaction failure during the naira redesign exercise, prompting an audit to investigate the cause.
The apex bank, In the meantime, has blocked the e-payments of 572 bank clients due to fraud-related difficulties with their Bank Verification Number (BVN).
At the 34th CBN seminar for finance correspondents and business editors held in Calabar, Cross Rivers State, Deputy Director of the Payment System Department Adewuyi Adeyemi made the announcement.
The number of deals has increased twice in the last four years, he noted. The first occasion occurred in January of this year, with the redesign of currencies, and during the COVID outbreak. There are pros and cons to the increase in traffic.
Read this: President Buhari approves MOFI partial exclusion from TSA
We had Payment System Vision, PSV 2020, during the COVID, and we were aiming to encourage the widespread use of electronic payments across all areas of the economy. Thanks to COVID’s efforts, we were able to surpass our goal for electronic payment transactions.
It was the same story again this year. I can tell that we were unprepared for the surge in traffic that occurred when the naira was redesigned. That’s why, among other things, we’ve determined internally that this year we’ll do an infrastructure audit according to the internationally accepted Financial Market Infrastructure concept.
We’ve been here before. Belonged to the PSV 2020 package. It was accomplished by us in 2018. Therefore, we have the necessary expertise. As CBN, we are not participating. To avoid any potential for prejudice, we want to hire an outside expert from outside the country.
Read this: Securities and Exchange Commission begins early phase of regulations for fintechs
The audit will allow us to evaluate our degree of maturity in relation to global norms. This will help us figure out what parts of our infrastructure are lacking and how to fix them so that you may move in.
Adeyemi has also revealed that 572 bank clients’ BVNs have been banned from e-payments by the CBN owing to fraud-related concerns.
Adeyemi continued by saying that the 572 clients’ BVNs have been put on a watchlist, which means they are no longer permitted to use the e-payment system and must instead visit the branch of the bank where their account is domiciled in order to perform banking activities.
