The consultants are now mockingly called “Cardoso women” across the CBN. One source giggled when our reporter requested a further explanation of the term.
The women’s presence, operation, and compensation have set tongues wagging across the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Senior staff members across the CBN’s 29 departments are fuming and grumbling over how the women, arbitrarily brought in by Governor Olayemi Cardoso as consultants, have amassed enormous powers enabling them to sometimes issue directives to departmental directors.
There is also widespread anger across the board over what some insiders describe as the “unbelievably high and obscene” compensation the consultants earn monthly.
Mr Cardoso assumed duties as CBN governor on 22 September 2023. Some insiders said the women arrived with him that day at the bank. But some sources said the women only joined days later and have remained at the regulatory institution ever since, sparking suspicion and debate about their relationship with the governor, value to the institution, and huge monthly pay.
The women at the centre of this raging controversy are Nkiru Balonwu, founder of The Africa Soft Power Group, and Daphne Dafinome, a chartered accountant and chief operating officer of Crowe Dafinone, a Nigerian accounting firm.
There is a third “technical consultant” called Shola Phillips who joined Mr Cardoso’s kitchen cabinet from Citibank. But our sources said Shola’s presence and activities have not been as disruptive and controversial as those of her two colleagues just as the terms of her engagement are not immediately clear.
The consultants are now mockingly called “Cardoso women” across the bank. One source giggled when our reporter requested a 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.
The consultants are now mockingly called “Cardoso women” across the bank.
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. 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.
Ms Balonwu and Dafinone as Fifth and Sixth CBN Deputy Governors
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.
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