By Vera Chinonso Aliyu and Ishola Adeleke, YeyeNews.com, October 13, 2021
The Nigerian government has officially started online cryptocurrency trade to raise funds in the face of dwindling resources, a source in the Ministry of Finance told YeyeNews.com. “Federal Executive Council approved the measure at an emergency meeting in April. We made a profit of $5,000 worth of bitcoin in our last trading session. This may sound small but a cumulative result spread over period of time may bring in something substantial into our fast drying up national purse”, the source told YeyeNews.com.
“This is part of some innovative economic policies that President Buhari will be rolling out in the coming months”, a presidential spokesman told Yeyenews.com. When asked how the ban on cryptocurrency trade will affect the legality of this measure the spokesman said “the government cannot be affected by such. We can operate outside the ban because we made it in the first place”. He then added that “the nation is in an economic emergency which calls for extraordinary measures otherwise a catastrophic collapse may be imminent.”
When YeyeNews.com asked the source the platform they were using, he said they were in Binance and it is secure and that Nigerians should not worry about the money disappearing into the thin air. He also said that they were using Binance Coin or BNB for every transaction and therefore saving Nigeria 25 percent in commission and fees on each transaction.
Meanwhile, the PDP has criticized the idea of trading cryptocurrencies with the nation’s meager resources expressing fear that this may plunge the nation into a bigger crisis than it seeks to solve. “This government has already run out of ideas. They have destroyed the economy and amassed so much debt that all the resources we generate now goes into debt servicing. They have now decided to venture into the dangerously crypto world. We pray Nigeria survives this government.”
In a swift response the APC accused the PDP of fear mongering saying there is no cause for alarm. “We have world class economic managers in the Buhari administration who have successfully repositioned our economy to become one the best performing in the world. This is what the PDP failed to achieve in 16 years. Oil is becoming useless so Buhari is rapidly diversifying the economy. Going into cryptocurrency is a masterstroke. We can generate far more revenue than we get from oil”, the APC media coordinator told YeyeNews.com reporter.
