In the face of the current challenges facing Nigerians due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has called for the suspension of charges for use of ATM cards and low amount mobile fund transfers during the COVID-19 lockdown.
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The PDP made the call in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, on Sunday in Abuja.
It stated that the suspension of such charges should be part of the solution to ease the burden on poor Nigerians during the lockdown.
The party called on the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, to make an arrangement with commercial banks to suspend the charges.
According to Ologbondiyan, the lockdown had subjected the majority of Nigerians to extensive use of ATM and mobile transfers for survival, making it imperative to suspend charges on minimal transactions within this period of restriction.
He stated:
The PDP demands the CBN to immediately liaise with commercial banks and stimulate a special social sustenance modality to defray the cost of such charges, particularly to cover minimal transactions in favour of vulnerable Nigerians.”
Ologbondiyan also urged the Federal Government to activate similar social sustenance scheme to immediately defray electricity tariff, particularly in areas populated by low income and vulnerable Nigerians within the period of the lockdown.
The PDP calls on the federal government to show compassion on suffering Nigerians whose means of subsistence have been crippled by the lockdown, and immediately provide funds to electricity distribution companies to actuate the tariff suspension within this period.”
He also advised the federal government to immediately commence the collation of data from trade unions and cooperative societies covering low-income groups such as market women, Okada riders, artisans, cab drivers and labourers among others.
This, according to him, is for possible economic recovery funds and loans to buoy their businesses at the end of the lockdown.
He said that citizens were passing through difficult and harrowing experiences.
Ologbondiyan said that the PDP was worried that the federal government was yet to reach out to most vulnerable Nigerians, whose survival directly depended on daily income in the markets, shops and streets crippled by the COVID-19 lockdown.
Consequently, the PDP restates its call on President Muhammadu Buhari to immediately extend similar financial intervention that was released to Lagos State to all other states of the federation,” he said.
