The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), on Tuesday released an amendment to its Guidelines on Transaction Switching in Nigeria, in what is expected to ensure a competitive environment and promote shared services and innovation.
Section 2.6.3 of the guidelines which stipulates that “the NCS (National Central Switch) shall not own or promote any card business or retail products and shall be run in accordance with international best practice,” was amended to “The NCS shall be run in accordance with international best practice.”
This means that NCS may now own and promote card business or retail products, in what the apex bank said in its circular referenced BPS/DIR/GEN/CIR/03/008, dated October 17, 2016 and signed by Dipo Fatokun, Director, Banking and Payment System Department of the CBN, is part of measures to ensure “that the Guidelines in Transaction Switching Services in Nigeria support the objective for payments system efficiency and financial inclusion.”
Consequently, the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS) is to communicate the Application Programming Interface (API) and other specifications of all its products to all banks and other licenced operators, including switches, mobile money operators and payments services providers immediately.
