Cbn Pegs Fx To N375 Per Dollar For School Fees

BEVERLY HILLS, February 17, (THEWILL) – The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has pegged the Naira exchange rate for payment of school fees abroad and Personal Travel Allowance (PTA) at N375 to the dollar.

The directive was given in a closed-door meeting, held in Lagos, between the CBN and all the chief executive officers of commercial banks as well as other authorised Forex dealers, in line with CBN's determination to boost dollar supply in the economy as well as to bridge the wide gap between the interbank foreign exchange (FX) market and the parallel market.

The meeting was chaired by the CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, who assured the commercial banks that the central bank would provide enough dollars to meet all FX demands for the items.

The apex bank also promised to give weekly allocations of $1million to Deposit Money Banks (DMB) in the country, while the banks would be expected to sell to their customers at the rate of N375 per dollar and that heavy sanction awaits any authorised FX dealer that flouts the rule.

THEWILL gathered that the new rate for school fees and PTA would become effective from Monday but the CBN said it would only cater for those in the universities and the persons involved can only get $15,000 per term while the FX would be wired directly to the school abroad.

Applicants for FX for tuition fees must have tax clearance certificates and Bank Verification Number.

Also, for the PTA, the CBN declared that people are entitled to PTA only if their flight(s) is not less than five hours and they are only entitled to $4,000 per quarter.

THEWILL recalls that the CBN, in recent times, in meeting the dollar demand of the country, particularly for sectors that are crucial to economic growth and development, had regularly sold foreign exchange at the forwards end of the interbank market to clear the backlog.

During the week CBN had released the total amount of dollar allocation to customers in December last year and January this year. Together, banks in the country had sold $2.83 billion for utilization in the critical sectors of the economy such as manufacturing, agriculture, raw materials, aviation, petroleum products amongst others in line with the 60:40 foreign exchange policy.

The policy prioritizes forex sales to manufacturers, agriculture, plant and machinery, critical raw materials, among others, and requires banks to publish on a weekly basis the volume and value of foreign exchange that they sell, who they sell it to and for what purpose.