BDCs list challenges, unveil website, plan institute

The Bureau De Change operators have expressed over the many challenges that they have had to contend with, which they said, have inhibited their operations and in carrying out their daily legitimate activities.
 
These, they said, include excessive regulation, multiple exchange rate, abnormal bank charges, Value Added Tax (VAT), and Commission on Turnover (COT), the continued existence of parallel market operators, illegal International Money Transfer Operators (IMTOs), porous international borders, complex documentation requirements and poor capacity/skills of operators. 
 
Under the aegis of the Association of Bureau De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON), the National Chairman, Aminu Gwadabe, said they have complained about these hitches severally, which negatively impact on their efforts toward compliance to statutory and regulatory requirements.He said six units within the CBN are involved with BDC regulations, supervision, licensing, monitoring, noting that these constitute multiple regulation of a unit of the financial sub-sector that is only involved as a small market player.
 
Gwadabe, who made the observation at the launch of the association’s dedicated website WWW.NAIJABDCS.COM, in Lagos, said an operator is expected to render daily, monthly, quarterly, half yearly, and yearly returns to these various departments of the same corporate body, which is cumbersome, repetitive and time consuming for both the operator and the regulator.
 
Still, they are under obligation to render the same returns to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), and Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), a development that has become heavy burden on the BDCs considering the little margin allowed on their transactions.
 
ABCON therefore, used the opportunity to appeal to CBN to take urgent steps to review the rate at which the dollar is sold to BDCs in order to boost ongoing recovery of the naira against dollar.
 
Meanwhille, ABCON chief said the decision to own a website was borne by the fact that many Nigerians and businesses have endured the publication of subjective news in the industry through sources that cannot be trusted.“It was on this premise that the ABCON decided to challenge the status quo with a superior idea and platform in the Naijabdcs.com, which is being launched today as a viable voice in financial and business news reporting.

“Interestingly, all Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)-licensed BDCs in Nigeria have given the website their backing…I also want to thank the CBN for giving the website “no-objection” approval and for the support and patronage we expect from the regulator even as we implore it to look seriously into major challenges facing the BDC sector,” he said.
 
Gwadabe also implored CBN to grant ABCON an approval in principle for the proposed trading platforms, to enable it and its technology partners the boost needed to kick-start the project.He likewise, sought an issuance of Letter of Consent to the proposed training institute by ABCON, as a boost to the management’s commitment to capacity building of BDC members and competence level in the sector.