How CBN gov employed 2 female friends, paid them millions as monthly salary
Some bizarre allegations have come to limelight about the Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN) governor, Mr Olayemi Cardoso, employing two of his female friends as consultants when he was appointed as CBN governor by the federal government.
Premium Times gathered that the two female consultants were placed on a monthly salary of 50 million naira and 35 million naira every month.
According to Premium Times, their names are Nkiru Belonwu, founder of The Africa Soft Power Group, and Daphne Dafinome, a chartered accountant and chief operating officer of Crowe Dafinone, a Nigerian accounting firm.
Nkiru’s monthly salary from CBN is 50 million naira every month while Daphne earns 35 million naira every month.
Nkiru for instance earns more than what the governor is paid every month as CBN governor, the report revealed.
She also earns more than CBN deputy governors.
Her salary also dwarfs the combined pay of 15 directors, who earn below N3 million monthly.
On her part, Ms Dafinone earns N35 million monthly, said to be higher than the combined salaries of 10 directors.
On the other hand, insiders said Ms Dafinone’s consultancy role is not clearly defined; she merely takes on any responsibility assigned to her by Mr Cardoso.
Only recently, the governor tasked her with designing and implementing a controversial early exit programme to pay off at least 1,000 staff members into voluntary retirements.
According to Premium Times, Mr Cardoso tapped her for this role while bypassing the bank’s human resources department, which is statutorily charged with developing and administering human capital management policies, functions and processes.
The two consultants are now mockingly called “Cardoso women” across the bank. One source giggled when Premium Times requested further explanation of the term. “You should be able to decode what that means yourself,” the official said.
Directors at the CBN said Mr Cardoso arbitrarily hired the women as consultants without following laid down rules, with no terms of reference, deliverables or timelines for the delivery of their consultancies.
For instance, they queried the hiring of Ms Balonwu as a corporate communication consultant when the CBN has an elaborate, efficient, and well-staffed corporate communication department led by a director and tasked with ensuring effective, timely and qualitative internal and external communication engagement and feedback.
“Why do you abuse your office to engage family and friends and make them millionaires this way? a staff member lamented. “It is disturbing because even Emefiele, with all his weaknesses, did not act with this impunity.
“These women are doing nothing. They are not adding any value to the bank. The governor is just enriching them because they are his friends. There are 29 experienced directors, 170 deputy directors, and over 400 PhD holders in CBN. There is no need to domicile consultants in the bank.”
The CBN has four deputy governors: Emem Usoro (Corporate Services Directorate), Muhammad Dattijo (Economic Policy Directorate), Philip Ikeazor (Financial System Stability Directorate), and Bala Bello (Operations Directorate). However, staff members now derisively refer to Ms Balonwu and Dafinone as the fifth and sixth deputy governors of the bank, saying the two have amassed so much power to be so called.
Directors said the consultants now write memos on CBN letterheads, issuing directives even when they are unknown to the bank’s structure and organogram.
They said they are consultants, but they have permanent offices in the bank, and their consultancies have no end dates,” one director said. “I am tempted to say they are even more influential than the deputy governors. Their offices are on the eleventh floor, just like the governor’s. The deputy governors are on the tenth floor, below the so-called consultants. They even bypass deputy governors to give direct instructions to directors.”
Another bank insider corroborated the director’s claim, saying he once overheard one of the women boasting that “if she draws a line at the bank, even the governor dare not cross it”.
“I can tell you the women are the real people running the CBN. Cardoso has become a mere figurehead,” a third director said.
Credit: Premium Times.
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