The Chief Executive Officer of Financial Derivatives, Bismark Rewane, has revealed that the Nigerian government, through the Central Bank of Nigeria, has spent almost $8 billion defending the naira at the foreign exchange market in the last months.

Rewane, a renowned economist, disclosed this at the weekend in an interview with Channels Television.

He was reacting to the decision by the Monetary Policy Committee to retain the country’s interest rate at 27.50 percent at the same time, maintaining other MPR parameters.

Explaining the reason the Naira has appreciated to N1,505 and N1,507 across parallel and official foreign exchange markets, he noted that the apex bank has several initiatives to support the country’s currency.

“We’ve also borrowed $4 billion in bond issues. When you take a look at that, you’ll see there is a lot of work. We’ve actually spent almost $8 billion trying to support the naira at current levels,” Rewane stated.

According to him, Nigeria’s January inflation figure, which dropped to 24.48 percent after the Consumer Price Index rebasing, does not reflect the reality of ordinary Nigerians.

“There’s no way that inflation can reduce by 10% in a short period. The man on the street does not believe that inflation has come down as sharply as that,” he said.