The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, has said that, despite the progress made in several sectors of the finance markets, drastic changes are required if the country is to be able to competitively challenge in the global financial markets.
He said this at the keynote address of the 2016 edition of the annual Banking and Finance Conference of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN). The address was entitled “Innovation in the Financial Services Sector: Driving Nigeria’s New Economy”. It was in this address that Emefiele specifically highlighted certain changes that the CBN will soon be implementing to restructure Nigeria’s payments system.
One of these changes was the creation of a special unit in the Police Force to deal with cybercrime. Vanguard quotes Emefiele as saying ‘…we are collaborating with law enforcement agencies to set up a Dedicated Electronic Payments and Card Crime Unit in the Nigeria Police. Similarly, consultations are ongoing for the establishment of an industry fraud risk intelligence bureau and a Security Operations Centre (SOC).’
In addition, the CBN governor also said that the CBN would cease acting as a lender of last resort to the payments system. “Furthermore, in line with the national payments system strategy, we are addressing settlement risks in the payments system, by signaling that the Central Bank will cease its implicit role of lender last resort to the payments system. CBN is facilitating the articulation of the framework for the adoption of “survivor pays” collateral management model, in line with the BIS/IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructure (PFMI).” he said.
These changes, Emefiele believes will ensure that Nigeria stays ahead of the curve in improving its fraud management strategy.
Parts of this article originally appeared in Vanguard News
