Microstrategy founder, Michael Saylor, says Nigerian government needs to adopt bitcoin and invest billions of dollars if President Muhammadu Buhari-led admininstration wants to end starvation within the country.
Saylor said to fix Nigeria, the country needs to buy $2 billion or $3 billion worth of bitcoin and issue currency backed by the cryptocurrency. His advise comes nine months after the country’s central bank banned cryptocurrency exchanges and crypto bank dealings.
Ripples Nigeria had reported in February that the central bank governor, Godwin Emefiele, said bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are used to sponsor terrorism and aid money laundering.
Saylor, whose company holds 114,042 bitcoins bought for $3.16 billion, but now worth $7.01 billion (based on current price) said in a video reported on Tuesday, that bitcoin is the solution to stop people from starving to death.
The billionaire worth $2.6 billion, said, “You wanna fix your country like Nigeria, or Zimbabwe? The way you fix your country is you buy $2 billion, $3 billion worth of bitcoin and you issue currency backed by the bitcoin.
That is the bitcoin standard. And every one of your citizens stops starving to death. And they live a decent life.” Saylor said in the video.
Globally, only one country, El Salvador, has adopted bitcoin as a national currency, with a number of nations, like Nigeria and China, preferring to issue their own government-backed digital asset.
The CBDC enables government to regulate the digital currency and monitor transactions done with the virtual coin, unlike bitcoin which ensures privacy from third party due to its decentralisation mode.
Nigeria has developed its CBDC called eNaira. It was scheduled for launch on October 1, but has been postponed till further notice by the central bank.
Although Nigerians still trade bitcoin through the peer-to-peer model, but they can’t use their bank accounts for deposit, as banks have been directed by Emefiele to shutdown crypto-related accounts.
