By Ghazali Ibrahim
Nigerians are expressing cautious relief as several commercial banks have resumed allowing international transactions on naira-denominated debit cards, a move many hope will ease years of frustration with foreign payments and reliance on costly alternatives.
The decision, which marks a significant shift in banking operations, comes after years of restrictions imposed due to foreign exchange (FX) scarcity and liquidity pressures. Customers who previously struggled to pay for services like Apple Music, Amazon purchases, or cloud storage subscriptions using their naira cards say they are finally seeing light at the end of the tunnel.
“I nearly lost access to my cloud services because my GTB naira card stopped working abroad,” said Olumide Ojo, a Lagos-based freelance designer. “Now that I can use my Zenith naira card again for my payments, things feel a bit normal”, PUNCH reported.
Many freelancers, digital entrepreneurs, and students abroad welcomed the development. Over the past two years, they had been forced to rely on expensive virtual dollar cards, offshore platforms, or black-market dollar purchases to access global platforms.
“This change is huge for small business owners like me,” said Amarachi Eze, an online vendor who imports software licenses.
“We’ve been burning money buying dollars just to pay for basic subscriptions. If this continues, it will reduce our operational costs.”
While the move is largely seen as positive, financial analysts warn that underlying challenges in Nigeria’s FX market have not disappeared.
According to PUNCH, Tajudeen Ibrahim, head of research at Chapel Hill Denham, said, the initial suspension of naira card use abroad was driven by banks’ inability to fund those transactions due to forex shortages.
“If banks don’t have sufficient FX liquidity, they’ll be forced to suspend again,” Ibrahim noted.
“The long-term solution is structural: increase supply and stabilize the naira.”
Though some banks have begun reactivating the cards, limits vary. Wema Bank, for instance, previously capped monthly international spending on naira cards at $500, but it is unclear whether that limit will return uniformly across institutions.
Customers are still awaiting formal announcements from leading banks like GTBank, Access Bank, and UBA regarding new thresholds and guidelines.
On social media, while many users praised the change, others remained skeptical, noting that similar rollbacks in the past were short-lived.
“They’ve allowed naira cards for international payments again? Great. But for how long? We’ve been here before,” one user on X.
Another user lamented the absence of clarity:
CBN and the banks need to communicate clearly. People are still testing their cards to see if it works. That’s not how policy should operate.”
As of press time, the **Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)** has not issued an official circular on the reactivation, fueling speculation that individual banks may be taking independent steps in response to marginal improvements in FX availability.
