Reports monitored by Forum from various private and public banks are that the new currency Leone seem to have ran short. As at Tuesday 11th July 2022, cashiers at certain state owned public/commercial banks were only paying Two Million Leones (Le 2,000.00) to customers who went for withdrawals for reasons best known to the various managements.
Customers who went to withdraw cash from private and state owned commercial banks were only allowed to withdraw Le 1,000, as a result of the banks experience with ‘shortage’ of the new currency due to insufficient supplies from the central bank.
‘Shortage’ of the new currency emerge less than two weeks after the new notes were officially launched on Friday 1st July 2022 by President Julius Maada Bio.
Bank of Sierra Leone officials say they are not aware of the said shortage of the new currency at commercial banks across the country, though the old currency is regularly being paid to customers in contradiction of withholding it as declared by the Governor of Bank of Sierra Leone, Professor Kaifala Kallon.
News of the shortage of the new Leones at banks across the country is being received with mixed feelings on social media, to a point that most people are expressing anger with huge doubts as to why banks should determine how much amount of money they should withdrawal from their accounts.
A renowned lawyer name withheld for personal reasons, who made several attempts at withdrawing cash from his account at one of the state owned banks, since last week, posted on his twitter wall that has since last weekend trying withdraw cash from his account at the bank but couldn’t make it due to what a top management staff at the said public commercial bank referred to as ‘shortage of the new Leones/notes at the banks,’ caused by inadequate supplies from the central bank.
In could be recalled that prior to the launch of the new Leones/notes, the Governor of the Bank of Sierra Leone, Prof. Kallon said in several public statements that with new currency when customers take the old notes to the banks, it will be replaced with the new Leones/notes from the day of its introduction to a period of three months and fade off from being use as a legal tender.
The old notes and the new currency are still being largely dished out to customers by cashiers at banks everywhere in the country. This inconsistency keep prompting questions of whether banks have actually ran out of the new notes/Leones or the industry is only limiting its circulations to the public.
In fact, this writer also made a transaction on Wednesday 13 July 2022 at one of the private –commercial banks in Freetown and he was dished with assorted both old and new notes /Leones as if the new currency is now in scarcity.
The Head of Communication at the Bank of Sierra Leone, Beresford Taylor was Wednesday 13th July 2022 quoted to have confirmed that; “there’s still a restriction of Thirty Thousand Leones (Le 30,000) formally Thirty Million Leones (Le 30,000,000) par over the counter transactions for individuals and 100 for institutions.”
As at late last week there reports that banks were running out of cash and that the new notes were also diminishing, which contradicts what Governor, BSL did say when the new notes were introduced on 1st July 2022.
The public is left wondering over whereabouts of the over forty containers of the new Leones
