The Central Bank of Nigeria on Thursday said that its current intervention in the foreign exchange market was purely to easethe pressure on the naira and had nothing to do with succumbing to blackmail from some quarters.
CBN Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, Isaac Okoroafor stated this while reacting to some trending posts in the social media to the effect that the current appreciation of the naira was as a result of the alarm raised about the illegal sale of forex at ridiculous rates to some people.
Okoroafor explained that there is no relationship between the allegations that dollar was being sold at 61 kobo and the current appreciation of the naira.
According to him, CBN has done its intelligence work on the market and came to realise that much of what was driving the demand at the Bureau De Change and parallel market was speculation.
The apex bank spokesperson noted that since the new forex policy, the CBN had intervened with over $500m in the market, which had led to the naira gaining strength.
