CAC’s three-hour business registration plan

That partly informed the former President,Olusegun Obasanjo, to embark on countless overseas trips in search of investors that will hopefully rejuvenate the system. Unfortunately not much attention was given to the former President’s plea because almost all the sectors including the manufacturing and textile were performing abysmally. This was later traced to the unfavourable business […]

That partly informed the former President,Olusegun Obasanjo, to embark on countless overseas trips in search of investors that will hopefully rejuvenate the system. Unfortunately not much attention was given to the former President’s plea because almost all the sectors including the manufacturing and textile were performing abysmally. This was later traced to the unfavourable business environment in the country. Of course, infrastructures and polices that wouldenhance business environment were not properly harnessed to make small-scale enterprises viable in Nigeria.
Successive governments had evolved strategies aimed at improving the business environment in the country but no tangible achievements were recorded in that direction as companies were seen not only closing shop in Nigeria but were moving to neigbouring countries.  Nevertheless, as a way of changing the situation, the Federal Ministry of Trade and Investment under, Dr. Olusegun Aganga, has put forward policies and reforms aimed at relaxing the tight business environment to attract more investors and expand the scope for doing business in Nigeria. To start with, the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) which is an agency under the ministry has implemented a downward review in the cost of registering companies in Nigeria. In addition, the Commission has concluded plans to deploy new software in the first quarter of 2014 to further reduce the registration period of companies to a maximum of three hours.
This singular act has attracted Quality Management System (QMS) certification from the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) and International Standard Organisation (ISO) as one of the best company registries in the world. Last week, while presenting the certificate to CAC on behalf of the International Standards Organisation (ISO), the Director-General of SON, Mr. Joseph Odumodu, said, “this remarkable achievement can be ascribed to the desire of the commission to improve on its processes, documentation and on-time delivery of services to its customers. By this impressive feat, CAC has formally announced themselves among the league of the lofty class of Quality Management System certified organization in Nigeria,” he said.
Just recently, the Registrar-General of the Commission, Bello Mahmud, while speaking at the 3rd Annual Seminar for Trade and Investment Correspondents and Editors said that CAC activities had helped to expose the “wonder banks” in the country. This, he attributed to the Commission’s collaboration with the EFCC, the CBN and other financial agencies to expose over 370 “wonder banks” out of 400 ones that were investigated. CAC is also investing hugely in electronic registration of companies and make its operations fully ICT-compliant. The commission had inaugurated a committee to review “contemporary law and practices” both nationally and internationally. The change he said was necessary because in the contemporary world, globalization is increasingly blurring business boundaries. “Until 2004, registration services were manually carried out in the CAC. Now, we are able to reduce the incidence of mistakes and duplication of names and numbers in registering companies”, he added.
His style of leadership is reflected in the current transformation of the Commission. This could be judged from the way he was able to resolve the protracted face-off between the then chairman of the agency’s Board of Directors, Barrister Jimoh Ibrahim and its employees immediately after his appointment as the registrar-general and chief executive officer of the CAC in November, 2009.
Since then, there had been tremendous improvements in the CAC especially in its annual revenue remittances to the Federation Account. The remittances have increased from N3 billion when he took over to over N5.5 billion as at end of 2012.
As a business guru who believes in time management and quality of service delivery, he has the plan “to ensure that the CAC evolves into a world-class companies Registry that is driven by the best technology and a highly motivated workforce, which will render excellent services, keep accurate and reliable companies records, and have an effective enforcement capability that ensures substantial compliance with the extant rules by all registered entities in Nigeria.”
Another plan is to “set up desks at major airports in Nigeria which would make it very easy for foreign investors to incorporate firms and start doing business in the country. Specifically, such desks will come in handy to attend promptly to investor’s enquiries, enlighten them and guide accordingly. This initiative will enable such investors scale the hurdle of not knowing exactly where to start from when they come into the country.”
Again, “the CAC, as part of the general policy direction as initiated by the Federal Ministry of Trade and Investment, will open offices in London, United States and China, being homes to some of the top international investors across the globe. These offices will reside within Nigerian embassies and high commissions in those countries. The benefit is that through these foreign offices, the agency would be able to reach out to potential investors who have never visited the country to provide them with all the support and information they need to make investment decisions about Nigeria. They could even register their businesses before arriving in the country. In its bid to prevent faceless people and criminals from registering companies, CAC has collaborated with professional bodies to ensure that boards of companies are made up of relevant experts so as to deliver products and services that are up to standard.
The measure was to directly check the activities of quacks and ensure that companies in sectors such as Architecture, Pharmacy, medical services, educational services amongst others, have qualified professionals on their boards. These professionals will have the responsibility of ensuring that the companies’ policies and practices confirm to professional and regulatory standards. CAC has once advocated for the review of Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA), after being in operation for 20 years. Speaking when the Senate Committee on Trade and Investment visited the Commission as part of its legislative oversight function, Mahmud said the amendment should also provide for on-line registration of companies. The amendment was to define the role of the CAC in the implementation of code of best practices and empower it to remove erring directors and officers of companies in line with the practice in most companies’ registry globally.
The CAC registers companies and keeps records of organizations as well as regulates them and it is in that light that the management embraced ICT to enable customers access CAC’s on-line facility from any location, from the comfort of their homes and offices, 24 hours a day, through an e– payment system. Other targets of the Commission include timely filing of annual returns and other statutory filings by all registered companies, business names and incorporated trustees, as well as making state offices more functional and at par with the Head Office in all aspect of registration services. The effect of these reforms is now been felt in the non-oil sectors of the economy. According to records, “Nigeria realisedabout 900 million dollars (about N144 billion) from the export of cocoa and cocoa related products. Export of cocoa and cocoa-related products have grown in recent years by an average of 40 percent and a cumulative of 280 per cent from 215 million dollars in 2006 to 822.8 million dollars in 2010. Cocoa is now the second largest earner of foreign exchange in Nigeria, in addition to the fact that it generates around two million or more jobs directly and indirectly, through its value chain.
“Besides the cocoa industry, the improvement in the ease of doing business is also partly responsible for the general increase in investment in agriculture in general. This has consequently led to a sharp decline in annual food importation to N857 billion as against N1.3 trillion. The result is that for the first time since 2008, inflationary rate is now down to 7.8 percent from 8, according to recent figures from the national Bureau of Statistics (NBS).” Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) must be seen as the main engine for economic growth. The growth must also leverage on private sector development and partnership. Regrettably, less attention has always been given to the sub sectors which are supposed to drive the economy in Nigeria.
As a point, other agencies of government must learn to evolve policies and procedures like the CAC that would weaken the tight and unfavourable business environment in the country using the available ICT opportunities so as to pull the nation’s economy from the doldrums.
Mukhtar wrote form Kano.