Exchange Rate: ABCON Seeks N250 To $1
The Association of Bureaux de Change Operators of Nigeria has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to work towards an exchange rate of N250 to a United States dollar in his second term in office.
The President, ABCON, Alhaji Aminu Gwadabe, said achieving a lower exchange rate for the economy would benefit Nigerians and lift businesses.
In a statement, he said the naira exchanged at N362 to a dollar at the parallel market and N358 to dollar at the Bureaux de Change, while it exchanged at N306 to dollar at the official rate.
The ABCON boss also said such lower exchange rate would improve the transaction volume for BDCs by enabling operators to buy and sell more dollars from their available cash flow.
He said a lower exchange rate against the greenback would stabilise the local currency, raise investors’ confidence, improve diaspora remittance flow and entrench fiscal discipline.
A stronger naira, he added, would raise the Internally Generated Revenue, help in the implementation of the restriction of foreign exchange access to 42 items that could be produced locally and improve the BDCs’ capabilities to thrive.
Gwadabe advised the the Federal Government to constitute a new economic management team and review government’s performance in the last four years.
He added that such review would give room for better performance in the second term of his administration, which would commence on May 29, 2019.
Gwadabe said the economy was not performing up to expectations and government was expected to re-strategise and review its performance in the last four years and develop concrete actionable strategies for better performance.
He noted that if the government waited till May 29 before setting up a think-tank economic team with functional experience on the economy, security, agriculture and human resource development, it would have wasted tangible time needed for a smooth take-off.
Gwadabe said that by now, the government should know where the complaints over its performance in the last four years came from and give priority to tackling unemployment, fixing road infrastructure, creating better investment opportunities for the people and companies as well as strengthening the financial sector, of which BDCs are key players.
The ABCON boss said, “It is only when the economy is buoyant that people will be able to save, and that provides enough liquidity for banks to lend and fuel the economy. The other sub-sectors including the bureaux de change sector will equally be positively impacted by a thriving economy.”
