Fakoyejo Olalekan
The founder of Patricia, a Fintech company, Hanu Fejiro, said Nigeria is the fourth country in the world with the most crypto transactions despite the ban placed on digital asset transactions in Nigeria.
Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had banned cryptocurrency from the Nigerian financial system in 2021, ordering banks to close accounts suspected to be transacting bitcoin and other forms of digital assets.
Join our WhatsApp ChannelCBN’s decision shocked many cryptocurrency investors in Nigeria and across the world, but despite the embargo, the adoption of cryptoasset has increased in the country, although the pace has slowed.
According to Fejiro, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Patricia, a company that also facilitates cryptocurrency trading, said Nigeria rose to the fourth position without regulation.
He advised that the government should embrace digital asset emergence, rather than banning it. Speaking on the continous growth, Fejiro said, “That goes to show that you can’t close the stable doors when the horse has already left.
“Today, Nigeria is the fourth country in the world with the most crypto transactions. And that’s not a joke.” He told Nairametrics.
“You know, America is leading, but America has regulation. America has had regulation for the past 2 to 3years now. Now, Nigeria with no regulation 4th in the world with about 22 million crypto users.”
He stated further that, Crypto is too huge an industry not to pay attention to really, and I think that the government needs to get aligned. There needs to be a handshake,” he added.
Fejiro said the government needs to shift focus from crude oil to human capital, and start supporting the youths who are interested in crypto, sports and music, “They say the youths are the future. What are the youths doing today? Music, sports, and crypto.
“There needs to be government support for these industries to grow. There need to be free trade zones made especially for crypto; there need to be public policies.
“We need to move away from the idea of fossil fuel in terms of crude oil and focus on human capital as our main resource right now.
“Now, everybody wants to go to Canada, go to the UK, we are losing the most important thing that we have which is human capital. So the minute we can turn things around as a government, Nigeria will become the real giant of Africa.” Fejiro said.
