A former member of the House of Representatives, Aliyu Gebi, has said that the cybersecurity levy directed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is an absolute necessity, News About Nigeria reports.
He stated this while speaking in an interview on Channels TV Politics today on Tuesday.
He noted that the Levy has been part of the internationally agreed protocols since 2015 but has been relegated due to certain constraints, including security challenges, where the county’s funds were being directed.
Recall that on Tuesday, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) directed all banks in the country to implement a 0.5 percent levy on electronic transfer originations, adding that the levy will be deducted and remitted by the financial institution, and the deducted amount will be reflected in the customer’s account with the narration, ‘Cybersecurity Levy.’
Reacting to this, Gebi noted that the implementation is long overdue and should have been done since 2015, adding that the government is losing a lot of money due to the non-implementation.
“Nigeria has been postponing the full implementation of these internationally agreed protocols since 2015. You may recall I was in Parliament then in 2015. I think it was in April or thereabouts, that the Cybercrime Act was passed into law but we could not fully operationalise it because of certain constraints that we were undergoing, especially the security challenge and where funds were being directed.
“But here we are today where it is an absolute necessity.
“If we know how much money we are losing, that the banks are losing, that account holders are losing, that the government is losing, because of weak implementation of cyber security protocols, we would pay the government more money to ensure that the government, the NSA implements it,” he stated.
He opined that, though the intent of the bill is right, the government had a problem with communicating strategically with Nigerians.
“The intent of the bill is right. The time is ripe. Is the time right for other things? Now this is a question that should be asked but is the time right for us to fully operationalise our Cyber Security Act and the Cybercrime Act of 2015 as amended? Yes, it is.
“We don’t do a good job of communication. This is our problem. We don’t communicate strategically,” he added.
