Nigeria’s Central Bank Governor Olayemi Cardoso has stated that the 1,000 staff who left the services of the bank in December exited voluntarily.

Mr. Cardoso disclosed this at the resumed investigative hearing of the House of Representatives on Friday.

The CBN governor who spoke through the Deputy Director Corporate Service, Bala Bello explained the early exit programme and the restructuring as well as reorganisation was to optimise the bank for enhanced efficiency.

He said the retirement scheme was “basically ways and means through which the performance of an organisation is optimised by putting, ensuring that round pegs are put in right holes. The manpower requirement of the bank is actually met.

“The man loading, which is the key responsibilities, key performance indicators of the bank, vis-a-vis the number of people driving the performance of that bank, is at a level where it’s optimum, balancing the human resource requirement, the capital requirement, the skill requirement, as well as the IT requirement of the bank. 

“You are very much aware, Chairman, the entire world is going through a process of digitizing its operations and once that is done, a lot of opportunities are created, just like a lot of redundancies are equally created.

“You have had instances where the request for staff to exit the bank voluntarily actually emanated from the staff. And I believe the Central Bank is not necessarily the first organization to have done that. I’m very happy to mention, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, that the early exit program of the Central Bank is 100 percent voluntary. 

“It’s not mandatory. Nobody has been asked to leave, and nobody has been forced to leave. It’s a completely voluntary programme that has been put in place.

“I believe several organizations across the world, and even within this country, both in the private sector and the public sector, are undertaking similar exercises. So nobody has been asked to leave. With lot of humility, I will tell you that this same program that is taking place is not at the instance of the bank. 

“Of course, we have our own challenges, and we know where we want to take the bank to. That’s Cardoso and his team, myself included. But this popular request actually came from the staff.

“In the past, you have had cases of stagnation and lack of career progression. I mean, in an organization, you’ve got a pyramid where from each level to the next level, you know, the gap keeps narrowing. If not, you are going to have a quasi-organization, inverted pyramid.

“It doesn’t work. It gets to the level where you have, for example, 30 departments in the Central Bank. You cannot have 60 directors, manning 30 departments. It’s not going to work. So, once those vacancies are filled, it gets to a level where some people, even though they are very qualified, very capable, and are very willing, but the vacancies are not there and are stagnated for a period of time.

“There are several instances in which similar exercise took place in the Central Bank, which has happened several times. This is not the first time. It’s not the second time. It’s not the third time. It has happened several times. You’ve had instances in which people at the top request that, look, it’s going to take me X number of years to actually aspire to become a director in an organization. But right now, there’s no vacancy. And the person sitting next to me probably has eight years to go. Meanwhile, I have seven.

“So there’s no career growth. And a lot of opportunities are out there. For example, among the people that have left, there are, like, three or four people who are going to set up a bank.

“The approach that we told them, literally, anything you want to do, if you need the support of the Central Bank, you are done. So the popular demand then was at the top, people that are stagnated, people that don’t have any career progression any longer, they have reached their peak, and they are willing to go and take other risks before they get to an age where they become scared to take risks.

“You know, those programmes are actually put in place to ensure that those people are given an opportunity to actually exit, go and start other things with their lives.

“But in this particular case, based on popular request, and I came with the Union Leader of the bank, the staff requested that in this case, similar opportunity should be extended to other categories of staff. In the entire period that similar exercise has taken place, it’s only people within a certain cadre, within the director cadre. The deputy director and directors who feel they want to go and start some other things, and assistant directors are given.

“But for the first time in the over 60 years history of the bank, the early exit program is extended to everybody who is actually willing to take it. And this came at the instance of the staff. So it’s not mandatory, it’s not compulsory, there’s no coercion, there’s no forceful exit, and there’s no intimidation for anybody to take it.

“In fact, when this same thing was approved by the bank, and it was open, the number of staff that actually came forward to take it was even very amazing. Like I told you, there are some other people that are even thinking of going to start with their own bank. Those who want to take it, took it, and those who don’t want to take it are still in the bank.”

Chairman of the Ad-hoc Committee, Hon. Usman Kumo, who assured the committee will be fair to all the parties involved in the investigation, noted that the Committee’s responsibility is to submit the report to the House.