The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has announced that security agencies, including the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, are currently investigating suspect foreign exchange allocations and forward contracts. These contracts, previously estimated at $2.4 billion, were executed by specific firms.
Recently, the central bank commissioned a global firm, Deloitte, to conduct an audit of the $7 billion debts, uncovering that approximately $2.4 billion of foreign exchange (FX) allocations from the $7 billion backlog were deemed invalid.
Addressing reporters in Abuja following the 294th meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee, the Governor of the CBN, Olayemi Cardoso, stated that security agencies were probing the FX transactions flagged as invalid by the audit report.
Cardoso mentioned that law enforcement authorities would investigate issues surrounding FX transactions that failed to meet the standards set by the regulatory agency. He noted that the Deloitte consultants’ report indicated that the majority of the transactions did not satisfy the criteria for payment.
“Recall that when we came in September, we had a backlog of forward transactions which were contractual and which had already been contracted before we came in. It was clear to us that it was very important in the interest of the credibility of the central bank, which then was very much in question, we were able to satisfy and take care of these forwards,” he said.
“During a Senate hearing, I had actually made reference to this and said that this would be a priority to ensure that we take care of these forwards within the resource constraints we had. And that was why, on a regular basis, I tried to address the issue with the press and be as transparent as possible to allow Nigerians to know exactly where we stood and what we were doing.
“During that period we settled certain tranches and then we got wind of the fact that, well, there were several transactions which, quite frankly, had some issues concerning the genuineness of them. That was how we brought in Deloitte management consultants who took time, and this did take months. This is not something that happened overnight.
He also highlighted the absence of valid documentation, among other violations and inconsistencies uncovered in the audit report. He pointed out numerous irregularities, such as the allocation of millions of dollars to nonexistent entities and the provision of FX allocations without corresponding naira values.
However, the CBN governor clarified that if subsequent investigations reveal that some of the transactions can be validated, this information will be disclosed.
“We determined that a number of these transactions did not qualify. In some cases, we have some allocations made in millions of dollars, which were never requested; we also had somewhere they had no naira and they were also allocated some foreign exchange.
“It was for that reason that we refused to validate those particular transactions. Apart from the fact that documentation was not satisfactory, in many cases, they were outright illegal. The law enforcement agencies are now looking into those transactions that as far as we are concerned, are not valid to be paid.
“I would emphasise that if there’s any information to the contrary, we would in due course consider that. But as of today, that is exactly where it stands and the law enforcement agencies are taking a very hard look at those transactions. I will say again, that the valid transactions as far as the Central Bank of Nigeria is concerned have been taken care of,” he added.