By ABUBAKAR YUSUF.
The Registrar General, Corporate Affairs Commission CAC, Alhaji Garba Abubakar has asked Banks in Nigeria to go beyond ‘Knowing Your Customer’ (KYC) to verify the authenticity of the existing companies which most of its operational status are inactive.
Garba Abubakar made this disclosure during a one day training workshop on Tuesday in Abuja organised by the commission on the use of Beneficial Ownership Register (BOR) in Nigeria.
He said the new Beneficial Ownership Register which was launched in May this year, was geared towards full disclosure of ownership of entities to avoid corrupt tendencies, and other related matters as well as enhance transparency and accountability in all areas.
Garba maintained that the commission is opened to all forms of entities verifications and information, stating that the new policy is the first in Africa.
He bemoaned a situation where entities hid under complex arrangements to transact elicit businesses, that was not verifiable, stating that the bad old days had gone with the birth of Beneficial Ownership Register (BOR ).
“The surreptitious control that harbor all forms of crimes and criminalities is gone for ever”.
He regretted the negative effects of lack of deployment of Beneficial Ownership Register were most inactive companies does not only operate , but not rendering the yearly financial returns, payment of taxes among many other statutory requirements of the law.
The CAC top notcher maintained of the commission’s commitment to the declaration of 2016 anti corruption summit held in New York to ratify the need to inject the new system.
“Many Nigerian companies operated their offices from make shift shops and homes untill the convening of the new policy of Beneficial Ownership Register BOR.”
“It is shocking in most cases in Nigeria that companies making billions year in year out in their transactions had not met the basic requirements of it’s activities and operations, therefore negating the tenets of Beneficial Ownership Disclosure BOD, but with the new platform alot of revelations had been achieved.” The Registrar General said.
Garba asserted that going forward entities with blur ownership will not only penalized, but delisted to serve as a deterrent to others.
He asked both private and public institutions to synergise with the commission to encourage the new order of Beneficial Ownership Register BOR to advance non- translucent transactions.
Highlights of the training workshop included demonstration of the new platform to the audience by the trainers.
