Rename columns when column names have special characters in macro

[qw213]

I am trying to rename my columns in a macro but my desired column names have spaces and special characters in them. (e.g. change column name aaa to aaa $)The code with nliteral works fine outside of the macro but when running in the macro it produces error: 

ERROR 24-322: Variable name is not valid.

My code is below

data names;
input name_old $3. name_new & $5.;
datalines;
aaa aaa $
bbb bbb $
;
run;

%macro process;

PROC SQL;
SELECT cats(name_old,' = ',nliteral(name_new)) 
INTO :rename separated by ' '
FROM names;
quit;

data data2;
  SET data1 (rename=(&rename));
run;

%mend;

%process;

I need to write in the macro because I have to perform this action to proceed to my next desired output for multiple data sets.

Thanks for your help!

[FreelanceReinh · Accepted solution]

Hi @qw213,

Did you set the required system option?

options validvarname=any;

[qw213]

Ah yes that's the issue I had preset it to V7 in the previous step. Thanks for your help!