The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has reversed its decision to put ATM and over the counter cash withdrawal limits for individuals at N100,000 and corporate organizations, N500,000 per week.

In a circular shared on Wednesday, the central bank directed all Deposit Money Banks and other financial institutions, including Payment Service Banks, Primary Mortgage Banks, Microfinance Banks, and Mobile Money Operators and agents, to disregard the directive given earlier and implement hence, a new withdrawal policy.

The circular signed by the Director of Banking Supervision, CBN, Haruna Mustapha, said the new order of cash withdrawal by Nigerian financial institutions is as follows: N500,000 for individuals and N5 million for corporate organizations maximum. This is a raise from the previous payment order contained in the circular dated December 6, 2022, billed to take effect nationwide from January 9, 2023.

The Circular stated: “Following our circular BSD/DIR/PUB/LAB/015/069 dated December 6, 2022 on the above subject and based on feedback received from stakeholders, the CBN hereby makes the following reviews: The maximum weekly limit for cash withdrawal across all channels by Individuals and corporate organizations shall be N500,000 and N5 000,000 respectively.

“In competing circumstances where cash withdrawal above the limits in (1) above is required for legitimate purposes, such requests shall be subject to a processing fee of 3 percent and 5 percent for individuals and corporate organizations, respectively.

“Further to (2) above, the financial institution shall obtain the following information from the customer, at the minimum, and upload same on the CBN portal created for the purpose: Valid means of identification of the payee (National ID, International Passport, or Driver’s License) Bank Verification Number (BVN) of the payee Tax identification Number (TIN) of both the payee and the payer. Approval in waiting by the MD/CEO of the financial institution authorizing the withdrawal.

“Third party cheques above N100, 000 shall not be eligible for payment over the counter, while the extant limit of N10 million on clearing cheques still subsist.

“Kindly further note the following: Monthly returns on cash withdrawal transactions above the specified limits should be rendered to the Banking Supervision, Other Financial Institutions Supervision and Payments System Management Departments as applicable.

“Compliance with extant AML/CFT regulations relating to KYC, on-going customer due diligence, currency and suspicious transaction reporting etc. is mandatory in all circumstances.

“Customers should be encouraged to use alternative channels (internet banking, mobile banking apps, USSD, cards/POS, eNaira, etc ) to conduct their banking transactions,

“Bank and Mobile Money Agents are important participants in the financial system, enabling access to financial services in underserved and rural communities They will continue to perform these strategic functions, in line with existing regulations governing their activities.

“The CBN recognizes the vital role that cash plays in supporting underserved and rural communities and will ensure an inclusive approach as it implements the transition to a more cash-less society

“All banks and OFIs are to note that aiding and abetting the circumvention of this policy will attract severe sanctions.

“The above directives supersede that of December 6, 2022 and take effect nationwide from January 9, 2023.”

The CBN has been under intense pressure to review the withdrawal policy introduced early this month, a development widely seen as the work of politicians who want to buy votes. The policy has been criticized by both the Nigerian public and lawmakers over concerns that it will stifle economic growth among other things.

Both the upper and lower chambers of the National Assembly had asked the CBN governor Godwin Emefiele to review the policy upward. Days ago, the Department of State Services (DSS) failed to secure a court order to arrest Emefiele, in a move believed to have been orchestrated by politicians seeking to force upward review of the withdrawal limits.

Earlier this month, Emefiele said the policy may be adjusted even though he has President Muhammdu Buhari’s backing to implement it.

According to google, the most searched kind of lawyers in Nigeria as of today in google are Immigration lawyers and Divorce lawyers and one of the most searched phrases in google is “how to appeal visa refusal and how to file for divorce”. This corroborates the known fact that divorce is on high rise in Nigeria; and also, that the “Japa” menace  is real. Many Nigerians are leaving the country and relocating to other nations in the search for greener pastures in numbers, especially the youths in their 20s and 30s.

Why visa applicants google-search for immigration lawyers is because 70% of those that apply for visa especially to the so called “Ivy League countries” do not get issued with the visa due to one reason or the other, and as a protocol, once a country refuses you visa, you have a right to appeal as a remonstration against the visa refusal and in some cases, after appeal, the visa status could be changed from denial and be granted to the applicant.

Visa appeal simply means that you are sure that you submitted every required documents, you know for a fact that you filled every required form, you know it as you know your name that you paid every required fee and every info you provided all checked out; you crossed every T and dotted every I in the visa application process, hence there is no reasonable explanation for you to be denied visa.

Truth be told, the visa refusals are sometimes an error in judgment on the part of the visa issuing staff, hence why when an applicant appeals against the refusal, they have the opportunity to take a second look at the application of the applicant and make appropriate decisions. For instance, I have handled some visa appeals where the embassy said that they didn’t see some of the documents that were previously submitted by the applicants in the application process hence why they denied the applicants visa. This obviously was a mistake on the part of the embassy’s staff and when we drew their attention to the fact that the applicant submitted all the required documents and we even resubmitted the documents in the appeal, they had no other choice than to reverse the denial.

In some countries, it cost money to appeal for visa while in some countries, to appeal is free and even if it cost money or not, everyone that have gone through the huddles of visa applications especially those that have applied for the US, Poland, Canada etc visa  will tell you that it is a lot easier and cheaper to appeal than to wait and reapply because in most of these countries, due to the high demand of their visas, it is difficult to get a date for physical interview; you can be given a date that is two years ahead or even more, like in the case of the United States.

The phrase “visa appeal” may sound like a whole lot to do and requires a professional hand but in most cases, all that is required of you in visa appeal is for you to write a letter addressing it to the embassy making a strong arguments in your favour on why you think the visa refusal was in appropriate, hence why it should be reversed and the visa granted to you. You will also be expected to attach and submit corresponding documents with the appeal letter; you are to do all these within the number of days window you were given in the refusal letter to appeal, if you did not appeal within that time frame, it simply means that you have accepted the visa refusal issued to you in good faith and you have no reason to contest or remonstrate against the decision.

You can rather choose to do this all by yourself but sometimes due to the complexities of what may be involved with the appeal, you are advised to contact an immigration attorney who will solicit on your behalf.