The federal government’s account balance is in excess of N2.66 trillion at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), document received by Daily Trust has shown.
The document also indicated the CBN claims on the government was not N4.7trn but N1.47trn which was within healthy limit as it was below the government’s credit balance at the apex bank. Recall that Friday, at the first edition Savannah Centre Policy Monitoring Dialogue held in Abuja, the former Governor of the CBN and now Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, asserted that the account of the federal government, domiciled at the Central Bank of Nigeria, was overdrawn to the tune of N4.7 trillion by the Buhari administration.
Emir Sanusi had also alleged that, the ‘CBN claims on the FGN now tops N4.7 trillion – equal to almost 50 per cent of the FGN’s total domestic debt and a clear violation of the Central Bank Act of 2007 (Section 38.2), which caps advances to the FGN at 5 per cent of last year’s revenues’.
“Contrary to his claims, the federal government’s Treasury Single Account (TSA) balance with the CBN as of 2nd December 2016 was N2.66 trillion (credit). In line with practices that even Emir Sanusi presided over, the FG has overdrawn another account at the CBN by about N1.47 trillion (debit) as of 2nd December 2016. In effect, therefore, the net balance of the FG at the CBN is over N1.19 trillion (credit).” The source explained.
A source at the CBN who crave anonymity said “contrary to his claims, the federal government’s Treasury Single Account (TSA) balance with the CBN as of 2nd December 2016 was N2.66 trillion (credit).
He explained further: “If a customer with XYZ Bank Limited has N100 in one account but has also borrowed N35 from XYZ Bank Limited. Even if the Bank were to demand that this customer pays off all his debt to them, he can do so and still have N65 balance with the bank. How is this a problem? How then could Sanusi have reached the conclusion that the CBN’s claims on the FG are over N4.7 trillion?”
