President Bola Tinubu has reportedly ordered the immediate removal of its Managing Director, Ahmed Halilu, alongside four key executives from the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc (NSPM).
The directive also affects Ado Danjuma, Chris Orewa, Tunji Kazeem, and Victoria Irabor, following a comprehensive review triggered by findings from a special investigative report into the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) activities under the previous administration.
Ahmed Halilu, appointed by former President Muhammadu Buhari in September 2022, is notably the brother of Aisha Buhari, the former First Lady.
Victoria Irabor, the outgoing Company Secretary, is married to retired General Lucky Irabor, who served as the Chief of Defence Staff and was involved in controversial decisions during Godwin Emefiele’s tenure at the CBN.
Abubakar Minjibir, currently the Executive Director of Operations at NSPM’s Abuja factory, has been retained to act as the Managing Director.
A top official of the central bank who spoke with Premium Times said the affected officials were asked to leave with immediate effect.
This shakeup at the company comes months after Jim Obazee, the special investigator appointed by President Tinubu to probe CBN’s affairs under the Buhari administration, submitted his report to President Tinubu.
The report outlined NSPM’s role in the controversial currency redesign policy implemented by Emefiele, which negatively impacted individuals and businesses in the country.
According to Obazee’s report, in commencing the naira redesign policy, the former central bank governor invited the now-removed managing director of NSPM to the CBN headquarters and directed him to redesign and reconfigure the old naira notes.
However, Halilu informed Emefiele that the task would be time-consuming due to the complexity of the new features, which included the positioning of the watermark, the presence of QR codes, different numbering styles, and other advanced security elements.
He advised Emefiele to reconsider revising the redesigns given the time constraints.
But Emefiele was determined to overcome all obstacles to the policy. He therefore contracted De La Rue, a company based in the United Kingdom, to handle the redesign for a fee of GBP 205,000.
After De La Rue delivered on the task, the NSPM was then tasked with printing the redesigned currency. The company did not quite deliver, triggering an unprecedented shortage of currency in the country.