CBN Clears Foreign Airlines’ Verified Claims, Pays $136.73m

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), fulfilling its pledge to clear the backlog of foreign exchange owed foreign airlines in the country, has concluded the payment of all verified claims by airlines with an additional $64.44 million to the concerned airlines.

Acting director of corporate communications at the CBN, Mrs Hakama Ali said the latest amount paid to the airlines brought the total verified amount paid to the sector to $136.73 million. In a statement that was issued on Tuesday, she said all the verified airline claims had now been cleared.

However, the president, Association of Foreign Airlines and Representatives in Nigeria (AFARN), Kingsley Nwokoma, said the CBN had only cleared $125 million out of over $800 million foreign airlines’ funds trapped.

According to Mrs Ali, CBN governor Olayemi Cardoso, and his team were doubly committed and would stop at nothing to ensure that the verified backlog of payments across all other sectors was cleared and confidence was restored in the Nigerian foreign exchange market.

Furthermore, she assured that the CBN was working with stakeholders to ensure liquidity improves within the forex market, thereby reducing pressure on the Naira.

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While expressing optimism that the market would respond positively with the latest injection of over $64 million, she admonished actors in the foreign exchange market to guard against speculation as such actions could hurt the Naira.

Sidi Ali, therefore, urged the public to support the reforms in the foreign exchange market, adding that the CBN would continue to promote orderliness and professional conduct by all participants in the Nigerian Foreign Exchange Market to ensure market forces determine exchange rates.

Meanwhile, Nwokoma has urged the CBN to adopt a quarterly payment plan for the over $700 million trapped fund  remaining with the apex regulatory bank

He said if the CBN claimed to have cleared verifiable numbers of the trapped fund, they should give a breakdown.

“The CBN should let us know what the word verifiable means because what is being owed is over $800 million and they have done $61million and $64million that’s $125million.

So, what we are asking is for the government to do more because more sectors are being sorted as they did over $500 million.

“Aviation is key and this fund has been lingering so, we expect they do something more tangible. If they do like $200 million

We just think they should do more and if they say they have cleared verifiable numbers, they should break it down from what figure to what figure and how do they do it? They should break it down and they should let us know how they do it,” Nwokoma stated.

The foreign airlines representative applauded the CBN for clearing the backlog saying, “we thank the government for listening and doing it little by little but we hope they can do more or have arrangements with the airline for quarterly payment that will be perfect.

“A systematic type of payment of every quarter will help defray the backlog and we can also get it behind us once and for all,” he stated.