The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) correspondent who monitored some banks in the Territory, reports that huge crowds of customers were seen at banks’ Automated Teller Machines (ATM) galleries.
NAN also reports that customers were also seen standing on queues entering the banking halls one after another.
However, MetroBusinessNews (MBN) interactions with some of the customers revealed that the banking inclusion and cashless policies of CBN may suffer setback following harrowing experiences by customers within this period.
“What am waiting for is the time for banks to open fully and after that, I will withdraw all my cash from the banks and rather keep it at home, than banks to be experiencing this hardship,” says a customer of one of the banks.
“This hardship will mark the end of my interactions with the banks, which have been reaping excessively through various charges even when these services are not being provided.
“How do you rationalize cashless policy or banking inclusion when inflation has eroded the value of naira which has become elusive in recent months. I will rather keep my money in my house moving forward when the situation is normalized,” says another customer.
According to NAN, the banks that opened for operations along Nyanya-Mararaba road include First City Monument Bank (FCMB), United Bank for Africa (UBA), Zenith Bank, First Bank, Fidelity Bank, Ecobank, and Access Bank, among others.
Earlier on Friday, the CBN said that it evacuated banknotes from its vaults to commercial banks across the country.
This came after the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) threatened to embark on a strike from Wednesday next week, over the protracted cash shortage in the country.
Hours after the CBN directive was announced on Friday, major banks sent out emails, asking their customers to visit their branches at specific times on Saturday and Sunday for cash withdrawals.
In emails seen by MBN, banks such as Guaranty Trust, Zenith, Union in Lagos said customers can visit their branches across the state between 9am and 4pm.
“All our branches will open on Saturday 25th, and Sunday, March 26th, 2023 from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm for cash deposits and withdrawals,” Union Bank said.
However, this is not the first time the CBN would instruct banks to operate on weekends.
In November last year, when the impact of the naira redesign policy began to peak, the apex bank ordered deposit money banks (DMBs) to work on weekends to allow customers deposit their old currency notes in view of the then January 31 deadline.