The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has disclosed that 50% of its budget has been slashed by the federal government, lamenting that this cut in budget has seriously affected its capabilities to fund some financial system initiatives.
This disclosure was made by the Director of the Financial System Stability (FSS 2020) of the CBN Mr Mohammed Suleiman when members of the FSS 2020 visited the the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) yesterday in Abuja.
According to Mohammed Suleiman, “funding has been a major issue, the FSS 2020 programme since its inception has always been bankrolled single handedly by the CBN. The CBN is beginning to weary a little bit because the current budget this year was reduced by 50% and that is majorly affecting some of our capabilities to implement some of these strategic objectives.”
Suleiman lamented that “50% of our budget cut is no small measure at all. We need to agree on the funding approach, we need to have a rethink and get the support of all implementing institutions. The FSS2020 is not a CBN project it is a financial system project, all financial system players have to take ownership of the project and be willing to support it.”
During the exchange of views on the way to move the FS2020 project forward an official of the NDIC revealed that it costs around N198 billion to fund the FSS2020 project.