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Nigeria: Forex – Lagos Assembly Urges Tinubu to Reduce Foreign Trips, Pilgrimages

todayFebruary 15, 2024 3

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The Lagos State House of Assembly, yesterday, called on the President Bola Tinubu-led federal government to reduce foreign trips for seminars and conferences by ministries and agencies as well as regulate religious pilgrimages as part of measures to halt the continued downward slide in the value of the naira against the US dollar.

While the dollar closed at N1,534.39 at the official market on Monday, according to the FMDQ data, it exchanged on Tuesday at N1,534 at the official market but stabilized at the unofficial parallel market, exchanging between N1,450 and N1500.

At plenary, the lawmakers advised the federal government and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on some bold steps to take to shore up the value of the naira.

Part of the resolution by the House was that the government should come up with a mechanism to reduce foreign trips for seminars and conferences by ministries and agencies. They added that this should apply to states.

The Speaker of the House, Mudashiru Obasa, who presided over the sitting, lamented the disparity between the dollar and naira while commending the CBN for taking some measures with the hope that such actions would yield positive results.

Obasa, who further commended the National Assembly for inviting the CBN governor for discussion recently, said: “In my opinion, the CBN and government should embark on sensitisation and information dissemination to make people understand what the government is doing.

“The pressure on the naira is too much, but the CBN should make sure that national interest is supreme.”