SEC to Review Framework for Complaints Management

Mr. Mounir Gwarzo, acting director general of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), has said the commission is currently reviewing its complaints management framework to ensure that differences are addressed speedily and effectively

Gwarzo stated this when he received members of the Association of Assets Custodians of Nigeria at the commission’s headquarters in Abuja.

Gwarzo said the Commission is reviewing the rules on complaints with one of the highlights being to allow grievances to be managed at the lower levels.

He therefore urged the custodians to be ready for the responsibilities to be able to manage complaints effectively.

He said one of the policy thrusts of the present management of the Commission was the empowerment of trade groups for greater and more effective role in the capital market.

The SEC boss hinted that the commission is empowering trade groups in the Nigerian Capital Market so that it can focus on its primary responsibilities of regulating and developing the market.

He said: “as long as people come together to form groups, we will support them. That is why we have reviewed our complaints management framework to enable trade groups handle complaints and resolve them and that is better for the market.

“The management is working to empower Self-Regulatory Organisations and Trade Organizations to enable them handle some complaints cases and deal with them with dispatch.

“The strategy of the management is not to create committees but to focus on prescriptions and ensuring that they are executed within reasonable time frames.”

Gwarzo also disclosed the commission is leveraging on how to make it mandatory for every registered operator in the capital market to belong to a trade group.

This, he noted, would help strengthen the different trade groups in the country.

“We are leveraging on making it mandatory for every registered operator to belong to a trade group. Some may not want to do so but that is a way of strengthening the trade groups, we are going to come up with that directive,” he added.

In her remarks, Mrs Kemi Adewole, president of AACON, said there is need to create conducive environment for foreign direct investments with a view to deepening the Nigerian capital market.

“Our clients are about 90 percent of foreign investors that come into the country, so we are the first port of call most times and we feel it is important we also keep abreast with what is happening around us and with the market,” she stated.