The Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Nigeria (ICSAN) has urged industry regulators to develop a digital regulatory framework to facilitate a seamless electronic filing process.

The institute argued that electronic filings with the regulators have gradually become an inextricable part of the modern corporate compliance culture and business transactions.

This is just as the practitioners, who gathered at this year’s Governance Practitioners’ Day, organised by ICSAN, also sought ways to expand their frontier of knowledge in the governance field relating to the era of electronic filing.

ICSAN President and Chairman of Governing Council, Funmi Ekundayo, said the need for professionals to brainstorm on issues relating to the profession is very essential.

She said the theme: ‘Corporate governance and regulatory compliance in an emerging era of electronic filings’ was essentially located in the fulcrum of governance practitioners’ professional engagements.

Her words: “Regulators in the context of corporate governance are the governmental agencies set up by law to oversee and regulate activities of corporations and organisations by ensuring they keep to the rules, regulations, and provisions of the law in their respective areas of operations. Regulators also do provide guidelines to give directions to those they regulate and they also impose and enforce sanctions on those under their supervision.”

In his keynote address, Company Secretary, FIDSON Nigeria, Yomi Adebanjo said governance practitioners should understand that the practice of governance is encompassing as it covers compliance, consultancy, and safekeeping.

He added that regulators play a major role in all and should make it easy through enhanced engagement.

“Landmark Information Technology (IT) solutions for compliance matters should be carefully implemented based on not only engagement but research and adequate data gathering from both practitioners and corporate entities whose expectations should be catered for.

“The general nature of authenticity, verifiability of the record is key among all regulators. The document you give, you must be able to give it back, you must be able to have it as it is without anything corrupting it,” Adebanjo said.