The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has reported how Sterling Bank’s head office withheld about N258 million in new naira notes in Abuja.
The ICPC said that the commercial bank had N258 million worth of new banknotes stashed in its vault, according to a statement on Tuesday.
“Operatives of the ICPC, last week Friday, discovered the sum of Two Hundred and Fifty-Eight Million Naira (N258m) stashed in the vault at the head office of Sterling Bank in Abuja,” the statement read in part.
“When the ICPC monitoring team visited the bank and discovered the stashed new naira notes in the bank’s vault, it was informed that the cash was the remnant of what the CBN had given the bank for onward distribution to its branches.
“The team however found out that only the sum of Five Million Naira (N5m) each was distributed to their various branches.”
The ICPC said that it arrested both the regional and service managers of the bank, but they later secured administrative bail.
The ICPC also claimed that it arrested the Head of Operations, Keystone Bank, Mararaba in Nasarawa State “for frustrating its customers at getting the new naira notes”.
“The ICPC team, while on its routine operation, found out that the Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) at the branch [in Mararaba, Nasarawa] were not dispensing to its customers, while other bank customers were accessing only one thousand naira.
“It was only after the arrest was made and clarification received from CBN that the position of the officers of the bank was not correct that the ATMs started dispensing five thousand naira to non-customers and ten thousand naira to its customers.”
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It has been reported how an operations manager of a commercial bank was arrested for hoarding new naira notes in Abuja.
The bank manager was apprehended after he was found withholding N29 million in new naira notes on Monday.
Many Nigerians are complaining about the scarcity of the new naira notes officially released on December 15, as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s February 10 deadline for old naira notes draws near.
The rush to possess the new currency notes and the apparent low circulation of the new banknotes have sparked protests across the country.
