The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has disclosed that it has disbursed about $61.64million to foreign airlines through various Deposit Money Banks (DMBs).
The CBN stated this in a statement made available in Abuja on Sunday by its Acting Director, Corporate Communications, Mrs Hakama Sidi-Ali.
The apex bank added that the disbursement is in fulfiment of CBN’s commitment to eliminate the backlog of pending matured foreign exchange in DMBs.
Sidi-Ali also said that the initiative was part of the CBN’s efforts to reduce its remaining liability to the airlines.
She also stated that in the past three months, the CBN had also redeemed outstanding forward liabilities of close to $2billion.
She said, “This underscores the CBN ’s commitment to the resolution of pending obligations and a functional foreign exchange market.
“These payments signify CBN’s ongoing efforts to settle all remaining valid forward transactions, with the aim of alleviating the current pressure on the country’s exchange rate.
“It is anticipated that this initiative would provide a considerable boost to the Naira against other major world currencies and further increase investor confidence in the Nigerian economy.”
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the total trapped fund of foreign airlines in the country is pegged at about $800million.
This led to the International Air Transport Association (IATA) threatening that some foreign airlines may be forced to quit the Nigerian markets if nothing is done about the monies, which are majorly from ticket revenue
The Association said that the Nigerian government is currently holding the highest amount of airline-trapped funds globally.
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