The Director-General Securities and Exchange Commission, Ms. Arunma Oteh, has said the commission has not abandoned the planned demutualisation of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.
According to her, a lot of work has gone into the process and the commission remains committed to completing the process.
SEC had commenced the process of demutualising the NSE over two years back, setting up a 21-member committee to work out modalities for the execution of the plan back in September 21, 2011.
But as the years passed without the completion of the project, some stakeholders began to ask questions about the probability that it would be completed, while SEC’s commitment to the process was also questioned.
However, in an exclusive interview with our correspondent, Oteh explained that it was not only interested in just concluding the process; it was also committed to ensuring that it was properly done.
She said, “On the demutualisation of the Exchange, we have done a number of things. We asked an industry committee to basically review what the practice around the world is and it did very good work, which it submitted to us.
“We also had the World Bank Group sponsor a consultant who was a deputy chief executive officer of the Toronto Stock Exchange to work with us on guidelines for demutualisation.”
Oteh added that SEC had looked at the work that was done by the industry committee as well as the consultant and worked on those specific guidelines.
She, however, said the commission was waiting for the work it had done to be reviewed.
She stated, “Demutualisation is not something that happens in a minute. The Exchange, particularly where you have (just) one functional exchange, is a public interest issue. So, it is very important that the custodians of public interest review what we have done and determine whether indeed what we have come up with is ideal for Nigeria and we are waiting for feedback from our supervisors in that respect.”
While waiting for feedback on what it has done, Oteh said SEC had guidelines with the Exchange to comment on.
She explained that the work done so far and the fact that questions were being asked about when the process would be concluded showed that serious progress had been made given the initial resistance to the plan.
Oteh said, “It is important that it (demutualisation) is done appropriately given some of the sensitivities we noticed when we began the process. When we began the process, neither the brokers nor the Exchange was comfortable with us even starting to think about demutualisation. People were not ready, so, it is nice that we are being asked where demutualisation is today. The process is ongoing.”
On plans by the Federal Government to revive the Abuja Securities and Commodities Exchange, which has been comatose for years, Oteh explained that progress was also being made.
She said, “The Federal Government has been making process from what I gather. The National Council on Privatisation, which is chaired by the vice-president, has approved the privatisaion of the Abuja Securities and Commodities Exchange. They have set up a technical stakeholder group to develop the requirement for such a privatisation. My thinking is that the will certainly be able to achieve that this year, barring any other thing.”
For its part, she said SEC was ready to provide whatever assistance it can to hasten the process.
“We (SEC) are also open to registering any commodities exchange. We’ve seen a lot of interest from people within Nigerian and outside Nigeria, but we are not the one selling the Exchange,” she added.
Source: Punch (by Simon Ejembi)
