THE announcement by the Federal Government that the controversial Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria Godwin Emefiele has been suspended took the embattled banker by surprise and shocked his two emissaries who had pleaded on his behalf to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Quest Times reports that once Tinubu won the Presidential Elections, Emefiele and his godfather Jim Ovia ran to Billionaire Aliko Dangote to help appease the then President-Elect. Dangote who had benefitted immensely from the Governor especially in regards to supply of foreign exchange favours then approached then President-Elect Tinubu with international but Nigerian based business guru Gilbert Chagoury.
They both pleaded on behalf of Emefiele who also tried to explain that his New Naira redesign and swap policy was not a personal attack.
At the meeting Tinubu made no specific promise but only indulged the emissaries. They begged the President Elect to let bygones be bygones and requested that the Governor be allowed to complete his tenure which was rounding up by next year.
Informed sources say both Chagoury and Dangote were requested by Emefiele to at least help him secure a “soft landing,” at the end of the day. But the eventual announcement by the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation Friday night that Emefiele has been suspended is the first indication that Tinubu had made up his mind to do away with Emefiele regardless of the pleadings of Chagoury and Dangote.
Aso Villa sources said the announcement was made right after the President approved a memo from the new SGF Senator George Akume recommending the wholesale reform of the foreign exchange policy and an investigation of the CBN Governor.
Said the source “Emefiele is gone, whether he would be thoroughly prosecuted or given a soft landing eventually is anybody’s guess, but a new CBN Governor is already pencilled in at the end of the investigation the FG announced.Emefiele’s problems which has led to his suspension now may have began when he was used by the cabal around former President Muhammadu Buhari to push the poorly implemented and coordinated naira redesign policy in a suspected bid to prevent Tinubu’s emergence in the recent presidential election.
The newspaper sources revealed that Emefiele was already aware his game was up after Tinubu was declared the winner of the 2023 presidential election.
The ex-CBN governor resorted to desperate measures to keep his job including prostating before the President in the presence of the emissaries. It was not immediately clear if the suspended CBN Governor tried to buy his way through with aides close to the President. But he leaned heavily on Dangote who sources said did his best in the circumstances to save Emefiele’s neck.
Tinubu’s axe on Friday night however came as a surprise,” a CBN source told the newspaper.
Meanwhile observers say President Tinubu’s decision to strategically terminate the CBN Governor reflects his determination “to assert his authority and shape the country’s economic policies according to his vision going forward.”
Quest Times
– The picture used above is for illustrative purpose only.