Several financial experts in the country have linked the current depreciation of the Nigerian naira to factors such as the increased demand for school fees abroad, among other contributing elements.
Speaking with newsmen, the experts also called on Nigerians to shun foreign goods and prioritise local options to reduce the pressure on the naira.
Tajudeen Olayinka, who is CEO of Wyoming Capital & Partners, said a rising patronage of quality locally made goods and purchase made in Nigeria products would strengthen the naira.
“It is not the main factor but it’s a contributing factor even though, lots of the foreign students have parents who can sustain them by way of sending money from Nigeria to them so, that can be a factor but it’s not a major factor even when they get there, and return money back to Nigeria through diaspora remittances,” he said.
Speaking on penchant for foreign goods, Olayinka said, “The penchant for foreign goods and inability to manufacture quality goods locally is contributing to fall of naira and apart from importing finished goods, we also import raw materials even though that helps the economy but we import everything into this country because we don’t produce quality manufactured goods here.
“Poor and substandard education is part of the reasons our people are travelling abroad to acquire qualitative education. This is putting so much pressure on our currency so, we need to get some things right to strengthen our naira,”
he stated.
A Bureau De Change (BDC) Operator, Saidu Abdulrahman, at Sango-otta, Ogun State, said more demands for Forex came from parents that had children in foreign universities and had to pay tuition fees.
“School-fees paying parents are majorly our customers. They can’t wait to get paid officially because of time is mostly against them. It takes over two or three months at times before banks can process a form A so, anyone in a hurry will come to the parallel market,” he said.
A bank official who worked with a new generation bank confirmed that banks could not meet all demands for school fee.
According to the staff who craved anonymity because he’s not authorised to speak, the Central Bank of Nigeria has planned that international school fees and upkeep requests through Form A would now be processed within 120 days.
“Parents who can’t wait for banks to process their request see parallel market as an alternative to meet their FX needs.”
