The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) launched a raid on the well-known Abuja Zone 4 market on Monday and started shooting at Bureau De Change operators in an attempt to stop the naira’s rapid decline, which currently stands at N1,700 to the dollar.
EFCC operatives, clad in their red vests, laid a siege at the Abuja Zone 4 complex to disperse the BDC operators from running businesses using firearms, spotlighting the desperation of the President Bola Tinubu administration to use all necessary means to salvage what’s left of the naira which has sunk into record lows.
Meanwhile, operatives of the EFCC reportedly arrested over 50 illegal Bureau De Change operators in Wuse Zone 4 Abuja, over the continued fall of the naira at the Foreign Exchange Market.
A Bureau De Change operator, Abubakar Taura, in Wuse Zone 4, told our correspondent on Monday the EFCC personnel came in vans.
According to him, the operatives said the raid was meant to sanitise the market following the falling rate of the naira against the US dollar and other major currencies.
“Around 3 p.m. on Monday, officers of EFCC raided Wuse Zone 4 and arrested over 50 of our members. They were complaining that BDC operators are responsible for the rising exchange rate of the Dollar, the parallel exchange market.”
However, as of the press time on Monday, our correspondent could not independently verify the BDC operators’ arrest from the EFCC.
Mr Tinubu’s strategy to float the naira has backfired and further depreciated its value on the global market, causing the prices of products to soar to more than 200 per cent.
Nigerians, who can no longer bear the hardship, staged protests across several states, including Oyo, where residents labelled Mr Tinubu “a thief” with no clue how to run his administration and lift the people out of poverty.
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It is unclear how exactly the raid on BDC operators would affect the naira’s value but the EFCC agents appear convinced they had the capacity to influence the currency’s worth.
In 2021, then central bank governor, Godwin Emefiele, had threatened to arrest the owner of Aboki FX, a reliable platform that publishes the naira’s exchange rates to other currencies. Mr Emefiele falsely claimed that the website was manipulating the naira’s value and causing it to decline.
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