Nigeria will be totally out of recession by June‎ – Emefiele

The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria‎, Godwin Emefiele, on Tuesday disclosed that Nigeria will be out of recession by the second quarter of the year.
Emefiele made this known after a closed door session with the President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, in the National Assembly.
He added that the country’s foreign reserve, which is at $31 billion, will give the apex bank the ammunition to defend the nation’s currency.
The CBN governor also said the apex bank is capable of meeting up with forex demand of ‎importers of raw materials, payment of school fees and needs of small business owners.
Emefiele said: “I think it’s an opportunity for me to say that we are going to continue this intervention because the reserve looks very good.
“As I speak to you, our reserve stands at above $31 billion and that provides us enough of firepower or ammunition to be able to defend the currency and we will do so with all intensity to ensure that foreign exchange is procured by everybody.
“You want to import raw materials, you will get foreign exchange, you want to import plant and equipment, you will get foreign exchange, you want to pay school fees or you are a small business that want to buy foreign exchange for you to import your small items, you will procure foreign exchange.
“And indeed we have started to see a downward trend even in prices and you also must have observed that inflation is also trending downward.
“We are very much optimistic that by the end of the second quarter, very latest third quarter, we should be out of recession that we are in right now.
“I think what is important is that last week we brought out an announcement, which is meant to encourage our foreign investor community to get involved as well in the foreign exchange market.
“It is the market or window that is opened for them to inflow their foreign exchange and come into the market on what we called a willing buyer, willing seller basis in which case there will be no form of any price intervention by anybody and indeed even including the Central Bank.”
Also speaking after the closed door session, the Chairman, Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and Other Financial institutions, Senator Rafiu Ibrahim, explained that the Se‎nate leadership decided to meet with the CBN governor in order to finetune policies that will attract Foreign Direct Investment into the country.