Help With Laws To Attract Govt Corporations For Listing On NSE, SEC Urges Senate

Caption: Acting Director General, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Ms Mary Uduk (middle), in a handshake with Deputy Chairman, Senate Committee on Capital Market, Sen. Foster Ogola (right), during the committee’s oversights visit to SEC headquarters in Abuja on Monday. With them is Sen. Shaaba Lafiagi, a member of the committee (left).

Acting Director General of the commission, Ms. Mary Uduk, on Monday urged the Nigerian Senate to assist with laws that will encourage state-owned companies list their shares on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).
The call is coming against the backdrop of a drought of new listings on the NSE, even as many state-owned corporations are by their agreements entered into with the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) at their privatization supposed to have offered a portion of their shares to the Nigerian public by way of initial public offering.
Uduk, who spoke when she received members of the Senate Committee on Capital Market on an oversight visit to the commission’s Abuja headquarters, noted that there are “very big government corporations that can be listed and that will give foreigners comfort to list too on the exchange. If this happens, it will be good for our market and also give confidence to investors.”
Nonetheless, she commended efforts by the Senators so far to ensure adequate legislation for the capital market, she said such will significantly boost investor confidence, while attracting foreign direct investments.
Responding, the committee’s Deputy Chairman, Foster Ogola, while agreeing with her submission, stressed the commitment of the Nigerian Senate to help the SEC with the necessary support to enable it play its role of apex capital market regulator in an effective and efficient manner.
Such support, he continued, is capable of encouraging new listings, besides helping to revamp the capital market and making it more vibrant, while in the process, attracting and sustaining investment inflows into the nation’s capital market.
Ogola said the visit was part of efforts to assess the SEC’s “performances within the year, challenges you encountered and explore ways the Senate can help to make you perform better as the Apex Regulator of the Nigerian capital market.
“As the apex regulator of the capital market, we expect inputs from you on ways to deepen the market and make it more vibrant and if there are ways we can assist with relevant legislations we are willing to do so to grow the capital market and ultimately our economy.”
Contributing, Sen. Mohammed Shaaba Lafiagi, a member of the committee, expressed the need for more interface between the senators and the SEC to address specific issues and find ways of solving them.
Uduk had also used the opportunity to inform the legislators that the commission has embarked on a number on initiatives to boost investors’ confidence as well as deepen the market.
According to her, “we just ended our Capital Market Committee Meeting last week and one of the decisions reached was to give an extension in the deadline for regularization to December 31, 2019. This is in a move to ensure more investors regularize their accounts thereby reducing the volume of unclaimed dividends in the Nigerian capital market.”
The CMC, she continued, opted to give investors more time to regularize their multiple accounts so as to derive the benefits from their investments.