German investors in the country have sought guarantees from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on availability of foreign exchange to repatriate profits out country.

This was one of the highlights of a meeting between CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele and a German Business led by Vice Minister and Member of Parliament, Mr Uwe Beckmeyer of German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy in Abuja.
Mr. Beckmeyer said that the essence of the visit was to familiarize themselves with developments in the Nigeria’s financial sector and to devise means of articulating business relationship between the German business firms and the their Nigerian counterparts.

He reiterated that members of his team with interest in such areas as power generation, light machines for Small and Medium Enterprises were having some challenges in sourcing inputs for their production as well as the issue of double taxation.

He pleaded that German companies doing business in Nigeria would appreciate to be assured of the certainty in areas of currency control as it affects profit remittances. In his response, Governor, CBN, Mr. Mr. Godwin Emefiele assured that that Nigeria will continue to meet matured financial obligations to foreign investors and her international trading partners.

He reminded the visitors that Nigeria has been going through economic crisis, due mainly to shocks arising from failing global oil prices resulting to severe shortfall in foreign exchange revenue. The CBN Governor told the visitors that given the development, the country is left with no option than to diversify the production base of the Nigerian economy and to curtail frivolous importation.

He craved for the understanding of the visiting team regarding the policies put in place in order to conserve foreign exchange and assured them of CBN’s effort to meet their demands within the available forex resources.

Other members of the German Business Delegation were Mr. Martin Andrae of Voith Hydro Holding GmbH & Co. KG, Mr. Guenther Mull, CEO of Dermalog Identification Systems GmbH among others. Also with the CBN Governor to receive the delegation, were the Deputy Governors, Economic Policy, Corporate Services, and Financial System Stability, Dr. (Mrs) Sarah Alade, Mr. Adebayo Adelabu and Dr. Okwu J. Nnanna respectively. and other CBN executives.

Source: Vanguard