Mr Kwankwaso, the presidential candidate of the NNPP, decried the CBN policy, saying it was targeted at tormenting “poor Nigerians”.
Rabiu Kwankwaso, the presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), has promised to reverse the deadlines for the implementation of the new naira notes policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), if he is elected president.
Nigeria’s presidential election holds on 25 February.
Mr Kwankwaso, a former governor of Kano State, said he would allow Nigerians with the old 200, 500 and 1000 naira banknotes to deposit them in the banks.
The CBN had fixed 10 February as deadline for the phasing out of the old naira notes. But a ruling of the Supreme Court on Wednesday suspended the enforcement of the deadline.
Speaking on Channels Television’s programme, ‘State of the Race,’ Friday evening, Mr Kwankwaso decried the policy, saying it was targeted at tormenting “poor Nigerians.”
“The people whom the government thought would suffer the policy actually own the banks.
“Should I win (the presidential) election, we will allow every Nigerian who legally earned his money to come and exchange it with new banknotes,” Mr Kwankwaso pledged.
The former Minister of Defence noted that “ordinary Nigerians are at the heart of our campaign.”
He said government’s cashless policy was good but for its time, while “the monetary policy was a mistake”.
“We did not support the idea of currency redesign at this critical time. We support cashless policy but the timing is wrong,” he said.
Expresses concerns over INEC’s impartiality
Recalling what he termed the “shameless and crude conduct” of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) during Kano State’s governorship election in 2019, Mr Kwankwaso said the electoral umpire has an opportunity to redeem its image at the next polls.
Mr Kwankwaso said INEC, allegedly in cahoots with security agencies during the Kano governorship poll in 2019, shortchanged his ally, Abba Kabiru Yusuf, who was the governorship candidate of the Peoples Demicratic Party (PDP) in the election.
Mr Yusuf, who is contesting in the 11 March governorship election in Kano State on the platform of Mr Kwankwaso’s NNPP, ran against Abdullahi Ganduje, the outgoing governor of the state and APC candidate in the 2019 poll.
“We are very concerned with INEC given what they did in Kano in 2019. We hope INEC will do the right thing.
“The INEC, the police and other security agencies connived with the government to declare the loser (Mr Ganduje) of the election as the winner,” he said.
Speaking on recent polls that projected the Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, as winner of the 25 February election, Mr Kwankwaso said the exercises were fraught with “lies.”
In the polls, Mr Kwankwaso was projected to be in the 4th position. But he dismissed the outcomes of the polls, insisting he would win the presidential election.