A Public Relations Consultant, Demola Olarewaju on Tuesday belittled the newly-launched eNaira, saying that “it simply cannot work”.
Recall POLITICS NIGERIA reported on Monday that President Muhammadu Buhari unveiled the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN’s) digital currency, also known eNaira.
According to Buhari, Nigeria’s Central Bank Digital Currency and its underlying blockchain technology could increase the nation’s Gross Domestic Product by $29 billion over the next 10 years.
The eNaira launch has elicited various reactions from the Nigerian public. And one of the many commenters is Olarewaju, a prominent member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Lagos State.
Olarewaju argued that “not one person currently investing in cryptocurrency will see eNaira as a crypto alternative”. He also said that cryptocurrency should not have been banned by the All Progressives Congress (APC-led) administration.
“When I thought this APC regime could be helped by criticism, I used to explain publicly that Economic principles, in a capitalist system, work in tandem – not in isolation. This eNaira thing is yet another attempt at capitalism by a pseudo-socialist party; it simply cannot work,” Olarewaju posited via his known Twitter handle on Tuesday.
“Not one person currently investing in cryptocurrency will see eNaira as a crypto alternative – it simply is not.
“eNaira is merely a digital version of your Naira notes – perhaps an attempt by a broke and indebted Govt to raise magic money hinged on fiat money to do basic stuff.
“Every capitalist principle that drives economic growth – from demand and supply market forces to competition etc – all absent.
“One is not an economist or a soothsayer but I’ve seen enough in my lifetime to know my left from my right – it doesn’t work like this. It won’t work.
“If as a means to get more people to transact digitally, Govt will have something to pat itself on the back for but then it should have been left for the banks, crypto shouldn’t have been banned and this does not need CBN involvement and Govt investment to pull off.
“Predicting that a man without a parachute who jumps off the 21st floor of a skyscraper will die is not being a prophet of anything, not even of doom – it’s just the natural consequence of breaking the law of gravity without activating the law of aerodynamics. It can’t work,” Olarewaju concluded.
