Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, has urged the Central Bank of Nigeria not to prosecute naira abusers at the burial of the mother of the Chairman of Cubana Group, Obi Iyiegbu, popularly known as Obi Cubana. Rather, the group asked the apex bank to expose terrorism financiers in the country.
National Coordinator of HURIWA, Emmanuel Onwubiko, made this known in a statement obtained by The PUNCH on Monday.
For days, Obi Cubana has been a social media sensation and the rave of the moment, especially with the ‘naira rain’ at the event in Oba, a town in the Idemili South Local Government Area of Anambra State. Several videos went viral that show celebrities, business people and politicians spray money indiscriminately during a concert held after the interment of the deceased.
According to Section 21 of the Central Bank of Nigeria Act, 2007, a person who sprays the naira risks imprisonment for a term not less than six months or a fine not less than N50,000 or to both.
But HURIWA said the spraying of naira at Obi Cubana’s event should not constitute a major talking point, adding that there have been countless high societal functions where the naira was also abused.
“The fact that friends and well-wishers who attended the event decided to show appreciation to Mr Obi Cubana, we in the Human Rights Writers Association Of Nigeria, think it should not become the talking point.
“The Central Bank of Nigeria under the current dispensation should rather be tasked by the media to confront the much more disturbing issue of how terrorism is funded and how armed kidnappers made up of Fulani militia in the North carry out their terrorism-related activities such as accepting huge sums of ransoms from victims of kidnappings but yet neither the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission nor the CBN have successfully exposed these illicit commercial transactions.
“EFCC and CBN and the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit should tell Nigerians why they have failed spectacularly to trace the financing of terrorism and kidnapping kingpins,” the statement read.
