CSO COMMENDS DG-SEC, GWARZO's POLICY AND WORLD BANK RATING

CSO COMMENDS DG-SEC, GWARZO's POLICY  AND WORLD BANK RATING

 A civil society group, the Rights Monitoring Group (RMG) has given a pass mark to the Director General of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Mr. Mounir Gwarzo, for his bold initiative policy that has restored confidence in the nation's economy.

The group's president, Mr. Olufemi Aduwo, yesterday in Lagos at a media briefing on the outcome of the World Bank/IMF Boards of Governors Meetings held in Washington in October this year, said Gwarzo must be commended for the reforms and bold initiatives he has embarked upon, adding that the introduction of E-Dividend programme started by the DG was laudable as it was commended at a session during the World Bank/IMF meetings. 

Aduwo who has been a Returnee to the World Bank/IMF Boards of Governors Meetings since 2012, said, before the introduction of the programme, over N87 billion was unclaimed dividends.

This fund, he stressed, was either just lying idle or some smart people were taking advantage of it for personal or corporate gains. Aduwo revealed that since the commencement of RMG's investigation into the matter, more than N33 billion unclaimed dividend was found to have been credited to investors' bank accounts apart from the investors getting their dividends whereever they may be.

"As at today more than N3 million investors have registered for the e-dividend payment platform. The introduction of the e-dividend is designed to curb the growth of unclaimed dividends in the capital market and allow investors collect dividends electronically while it also allows all accrued dividends to be credited to investors," Aduwo posits, adding that this initiative definitely would make those benefitting from the rot in the past see Gwarzo as enemy.

Aduwo declares that from his group's findings on the issue of alleged corruption, Gwarzo was a member of the board of the commission for more than two years in the capacity of an Executive Commissioner of Operations Directorate before he became the DG, SEC. Therefore, he is entitled to all benefits as stipulated in the Commission's Acts and Policy. He said that a retired army general serving as minister or occupying any political office still collects his full salary like  a serving general. That is the law, he said, adding that he will also collect salary in his present office without violating any law. So, the allegations of corruption against Gwarzo, he stressed, were unfounded and the handwork of elements within the system who believe the leakages and manipulation must continue.

According to Aduwo, the SEC has done so much to restoring the confidence of foreign and local investors in the economy through strong enforcement actions and improvement of rules and regulations in the market. The country, he said, has moved up from the 24th place to 145th position on the World Bank's Doing-Business ranking, indicating  that the progress made by the SEC along with the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC) in improving the country's business environment, is yielding positive results. 

The RMG president said the group therefore commends the efforts of the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi  Adeosun and the Central Bank team for speaking the fact that would serve as catalyst to foreign investors' trust in the economy while appreciating the confidence the World Bank/IMF joint secretariat has in RMG to partner with them in the selected assessment programmes on transparency and SDGs attainment.