BY COBHAM NSA, ABUJA – The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara, has explained that the decision to demutualise the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) is aimed at opening up the capital market and make it more attractive to investors.
He also assured that the development will ensure that the market thrives and conforms to global best practices.
The House had last week adopted the recommendations of a report by its Committee on Capital Market and Institutions, chaired by Hon. Yusuf Ayo Tajudeen on a Bill for an Act to facilitate the development of Nigeria’s Capital Market. When passed, the law will enable the conversion and re-registration of NSE from a company limited by guarantee to a public company limited by shares; and for related matters.
A statement issued by the Speaker’s Special Adviser on Media and Public Affairs, Mr Turaki Hassan on Monday, said the demutualisation of the NSE will bring the ordinary Nigerian closer to benefiting from the nation’s commonwealth.
According to the Speaker, the development will make more multinational corporations seek listing on the Exchange, thereby contributing to the nation’s economic development.
Speaker Dogara further said the changes made by the House, when agreed by the Senate and signed into law by the President, will result in more involvement of investors in governance, as well as a flexible governance structure in the capital market.
It is also expected that the development will make it easy to take decisive action in response to changes in the business environment where and when necessary, while also ensuring increased access to resources for capital investment raised by way of equity offerings or private investment.
In June 2016, Dogara became the first sitting Speaker visit the stock exchange in Lagos where he sounded the closing gong and promised to use legislative tools to reposition the capital market for maximum performance.
He said it is unacceptable for a large chunk of the nation’s resources or capital to be heavily concentrated in the hands of few Chief Executive Officers (CEOs), as it further widens the inequality gap; eliminates the middle class; and plunges more people into abject poverty that currently pose serious threat to the sustenance and survival of democracy.
The Speaker said that deepening Nigeria’s capital market will enhance wealth redistribution and deliberately allow it to trickle down to the ordinary people as against the practice where multinational corporations repatriate their profits 100 percent to their own countries without investing a dime back to the Nigerian economy.
The Bill will now be transmitted to the Senate for concurrence in a few days.
