Every local government in Nigeria has a Point of Sale (POS) agent present, according to Godwin Emefiele, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the strategy has generated N6 trillion in transactions, up from N48 billion in 2012.
Emefiele stressed the significance of POS agents in the apex bank’s cashless program when he went before the House of Representatives to advise the lawmakers on recent monetary policies, particularly the cash withdrawal restriction.
In the hinterlands, where there might not be financial institutions, he stated that it was crucial to make sure that people have access to financial services.
The Governor stated that the POS would provide the fastest financial service in remote communities while being represented by the Deputy Governor for Financial System Stability, Aisha Ahmed.
He said that there were 1.4 million agents, 14,000 ATMs, 900,000 POS terminals, 6,500 bank locations, and 6,500 POS terminals nationwide.
“Today, we have a very robust payment system that includes bank branches, branches of micro-finance banks, POS machines, ATM machines, agent banking, E-Naira, and many other options.
“To be specific, between the bank and the micro-finance banks, we have 6,500 locations, 900,000 POS terminals, 14,000 ATMs across the country, and 1.4 million agents nationwide and every single local government in Nigeria has agent represented. We also have a proliferation of electronic transactions. Just by way of a quick example, in 2012, we had N48 billion in POS transactions. Today, we have N6 trillion in POS transactions.
“Going to the cash withdrawal limit that was issued in response to the feedback from Nigerians in response to the comments made by this revered chamber, we took those feedbacks on board. CBN mentioned that we will be flexible in the implementation of this policy in response to the stakeholders’ sentiments.
“We have since reviewed the limit significantly from N100,000 that we had per week to N500,000 per week for individuals; from N500,000 per week for corporate to N5 million per week for corporate.
“We have also amended the processing from 5 and 10 percent downward to 3 and 5 percent. We have clarified the strategic importance of agents as important participants in the financial system because they play a key role in certain underserved segments in the rural areas and in certain market areas and they as well would be covered by this newly revised rule.
