By our correspondent
President Muhammadu Buhari has inaugurated the first Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) internet-enabled branch in Lafia Nasarawa State.
Speaking about the building when the President broke away from his Nasarawa State visit to commission the building, CBN governor Godwin Emefiele said the new branch “is one of the nine new internet-enabled offices of CBN constructed to ensure that the Central Bank had visible offices in Nigeria”.
He then disclosed that the state-of-the-art smart building was an internet-enabled building, created to bring the Central Bank closer to the people to “access CBN intervention facilities”. The building, he said, was anchored by the CBN’s Development Finance Department for easy and efficient delivery of the bank’s projects to the people”.
The CBN governor explained that work had been completed in similar “branches in Abakaliki, Ado-Ekiti, Birnin-Kebbi, Dutse, Gusau and Yenagoa, while those at Jalingo and Damaturu would be completed soon”.
Emefiele described the building as “the culmination of several years of hard work, using mainly local content and services as a way of enhancing the capabilities of our indigenous people without having to compromise quality, safety, health or environmental standards”.
He said the construction of the Lafia branch “is pursuant to the Federal Government’s statutory requirement for the presence of a Central Bank of Nigeria in every state of the federation, for currency and business transactions by government agencies and corporate entities in Nasarawa State”.