The launch of Nigeria’s digital currency, eNaira, has been greeted with varied reactions due to what many Nigerians describe as a poorly built app by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
About 72 hours after the launch of the currency by President Muhammadu Buhari in Abuja, the eNaira wallet has been removed from Google PlayStore.
This development came after several negative reviews from Nigerians who were disappointed with the process of registering for the app as required by the CBN.
Mr. Osita Nwanisobi, in his address of the development, said that the app was pulled down in order to enable its upgrade.
Nwanisobi said:
“There is an upgrade going at the moment by Google; try in the next few hours.”
Nigerians had expressed their displeasure over the liability notice where the apex bank had stated that it would not be responsible for any loss suffered by users.
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The limitation of liability read:
“In no event will the CBN or its directors, officers, employees, independent contractors, affiliates or agents, or any of its or their respective service providers, be liable to you or any third party for any use, interruption, delay or inability to use the eNaira website, lost revenues or profits, delays, interruption or loss of services, business or goodwill, loss or corruption of data, loss resulting from system or system service failure, malfunction or shutdown, failure to accurately transfer, read or transmit information, failure to update or provide correct information, system incompatibility or provision of incorrect compatibility information or breaches in system security, or for any consequential, incidental, indirect, exemplary, special or punitive damages, whether arising out of or in connection with the use of the eNaira website.”
Inibehe Effiong, a Lagos-based lawyer, however, knocked the CBN, saying that an attempt to shift liability was illegal.
Effiong said:
“The limitation of liability clause is obnoxious and unnecessarily draconian. The manner in which it is drafted is suggestive of the fact that the CBN has no confidence in the durability, credibility and reliability of the eNaira website. If commercial banks are to be held liable for losses incurred by their customers, there’s no reason by the CBN should be accorded absolute exemption from liability.
“Part of the problem with the eNaira is that the role of the CBN is conflicted. The CBN is established primarily as a regulatory agency with limited allowance for commercial, particularly governmental and intergovernmental transactions.
“Since the eNaira is a product of the CBN and not essential controlled by commercial institutions, the CBN should bear some form of responsibility for the use of the eNaira platform.”
Before it disappeared Google PlayStore, the speed wallet had a rating of 2.0 from 2, 150 reviews with many complaining of glitches.
