Regulatory challenges still bane of capital market – Okezie

Challenges posed by regulation in the Nigerian business environment have been identified as part of the major issues retarding progress of the Nigerian capital market.

Mr. Boniface Okezie, national coordinator, progressive shareholders Association of Nigeria disclosed this to Daily Times Nigeria, recently in Lagos. He said that e-dividend currently are affected more than 48 hours after the due date, raising fresh concerns.

Okezie fingered policy summersault, shallow policies and the commitment of regulators to meting out financial sanctions against setting up institutions to check abuses, as major challenges eroding confidence of investors in the capital market.

Okezie told Daily Times that discontinuation of the cashless policy by the government revealed that most of the policies were not deep rotted, but shallow and therefore could not stand the test of time.

The policy he said, forced many financial houses to invest heavily in order to comply with regulatory requirement, but now it has been nullified, such investments have been rubbished.

The PSAN national coordinator said that such policy that has been encountering challenges in the capital is the e-dividend policy.

According to Okezie, most claims by companies that their dividend is payable on the same day of approval by shareholders is usually false and could in future trigger a protracted court action.

“Most of the dividends are not paid electronically the same day they were mandated to be paid and I have confronted them on this and they told me that it was when the Nigerian Interbank Settlement System was being upgraded. When I asked the NIBSS boss, he said their system was not being upgraded.”

He said that based on the uncertain electronic c payment system in Nigeria, with resultant deadline of 31st July 2017 to end dividend warrant issuance, represents reflection of another regulatory challenge.

“Why must you affect shareholders, why must you affect Registrars doing their work, it can’t work. SEC should do their homework very well,, otherwise we will burn our fingers through the enforcement of the e-dividend payment systems.”

Okezie said that hence power is not contain in Nigeria coupled with software of the payment systems being imported, designing policies around technologies we are not in total control of , could amount to seeking legal interpretation that eventually may be settled by the Supreme Court.

You cannot say that you will pay me on the 31st, and signed to it, and eventually effected the payment on the 5th, I have lost the use of my money for five days. This is current situation e-payment system and e-dividend payment is creating.

He said that the same e-dividend was exploited in the alleged swindling of unclaimed dividends in via Afribank registrars, of which the SEC assured that they were investigating, and up till now, they are yet to make public findings of the investigating committee.

These among other issues Okezie said are the bane of the electronic payment, e-dividend payment systems of which could be exploited by the people in control.

“The regulators have failed the system hence through the uncertainties in dates of payments of dividends electronically, they are in the process of making the electronic banking and e-dividend payment systems problematic in the country.