NAICOM may axe low capital base operators

The National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) may revoke the licences of insurance firms that failed to meet statutory capital base in the industry, The Guardian has learnt.

It was gathered that the outcome of the proposed capital verification, which is billed for the first quarter of 2017, would be executed in accordance with extant laws.

The verification would enable the Commission to pool data for the implementation of a Risk-Based Supervision (RBS) to determine the health of the companies and how suited they are playing in their respective sub-sectors.

In the requirements for registration of insurance and reinsurance companies, the law requires a Life Insurance Company to have a minimum of N2 billion share capital duly registered by the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC). Non-Life must have N3billion, Composite N5 billion and Reinsurance N10 billion.

The decision to verify the companies’ capital base has created tension in the industry, as many believe that the Commissioner for Insurance, Mohammed Kari, would ensure that the full weight of the law is brought down heavily on the firms that failed to scale through the verification hurdles.
This is because he had done a similar thing in the case of insurance brokers with expired licences.

NAICOM noted that the business environment and the risk profile of the insurance industry have changed since the last recapitalisation exercise in 2007. As such, to protect policyholders and beneficiaries of insurance contracts against unexpected losses, there is a need to verify the assets and liabilities of all the companies.