AllAfrica.com reports that the March 31, 2010, deadline given by the Central Bank of Nigeria to move all off-premises ATMs in Nigeria to on-premises locations was not met by the majority of Nigerian banks.
According to AllAfrica, less than 10 percent of Nigerian banks had complied with the mandate by the end of the month, and the Central Bank is expected to penalize those that did not meet the deadline.
Only three banks reportedly made appreciable efforts to comply, while a number of banks made frantic efforts to avoid the Central Bank sanctions by beating the deadline:
The Central Bank of Nigeria is taking appropriate steps to facilitate the appointment of a number of ATM consortia to effect the current policy of redeploying off-site ATMs and has received applications from some registered financial companies in this regard.
Investigations revealed that First Bank of Nigeria Plc, United Bank for Africa Plc, Diamond Bank Plc, Wema Bank Plc and Ecobank Plc had within the last two weeks handed over their off-site ATMs to the consortium appointed by the Central Bank to operate off-site ATMs. A total of 1,446 ATMs have been handed over by these banks to consortium.
