ABUJA: The Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) has opened a portal to enable members of the public to personally conduct company or business name search free of charge in a bid to make the process of registering businesses in Nigeria cheaper, easier and faster.
Since the operation began in March, the commission had registered 4,585 businesses just within four days, while 50 per cent of those registered belong to the medium and small scale entrepreneurs.
The Acting Registrar General noted that all the commission’s offices in the 36 states of the country have been decentralised and equipped to register and finalise registration to the stage of issuing certificates to prospective business owners. She said, “the commission is further encouraging online registration services to make things easier for everybody, such that you can from the comfort of your homes and offices transact with the commission.
“In order to further ease business registration, the commission has extended its working hours to 7.00pm Monday – Friday in our Lagos (Alausa and Island offices) as well as six of its other offices strategically located in each of the geo-political zones.”
She explained that the Commission, in line with its statutory mandate and further collaboration with the Ease of Doing Business (EBES) secretariat has deliberately embarked on several reform initiatives aimed at easing business registration in Nigeria.
“The Commission will leave no stone unturned towards simplifying the process of registration and other services. At the moment, any member of the public can do it himself/herself by visiting the Commission’s website: https:services.cac.gov.ng/ Similarly, any member of the public wishing to confirm the legal status of Nigerian companies can visit the Commission’s public search: https:publicsearch.cac.gov.ng/comSearch/
She further said: “The Commission in line with its statutory mandate has deliberately embarked upon several reform initiatives aimed at easing business registration in Nigeria. This explains the Commission’s strategic policies like decentralization of its operations, deployment of the Company Registration Portal (CRP) and the integration of the CRP to the Stamp Duty Portal of the Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS) to further ease the process of company registration.
“The goal is to ensure that every Nigerian has access to online registration especially the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) to enable more businesses to come into the formal sector with all the attendant benefits.
This is in tandem with the reform agenda of the Federal Government aimed, among other things, at growing the Nigerian economy. through increased economic activities, employment creation, provision of infrastructure and making Nigeria one of the world’s top investment destinations.” In his remark, President of National Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (NASME), Prince Degun Agboade, attested to the transformation taking place in CAC.
He noted from his personal experience that his company used to run around for tax clearance at the end of every year, but was pleasantly surprised that last year, everything was uploaded without them needing to run after anyone for tax clearance.
