You may not require the services of a lawyer to get your business registered. That’s according to Alhaji Abubakar, Special Adviser to the Registrar General of the Corporate Affairs Commission in an interview with CNBC Africa’s Onyi Sunday.

ABUBAKAR:  As a commission, we have tried to improve the process of registration of companies. We have introduced an electronic platform that enables anybody, not just lawyers. Hitherto to access our services, you can either be a lawyer, a chartered accountant or a general secretary but since 2012, the government decided that as part of measures to reduce the cost of doing business the owners of the businesses can access CAC services directly.

As the owner of the business you can reserve your proposed name, submit your application to the CAC and you can collect your certificate directly. We have an online platform that enables customers submit requests for name search, they get the result through the portal, they print their result, they can key in all the information about the company; the ownership, the memorandum and articles and they can pay electronically. We are at the verge of deploying some incorporation hurdles that will allow you to do changes to the composition of the board, to the shareholding, to the address. That is the next phase we are deploying within the next month or two.

So, can we comfortably say we do not need the services of a lawyer when it comes to registration of businesses?
ABUBAKAR: Yes. To the extent that you can reserve your name, you can prepare your incorporation documents, you can present these documents to CAC directly and you can collect your own certificates but the law still requires a legal practitioner to review the documents and declare that the requirement of the act has been complied with. That is not the same with getting the documents prepared. So if somebody has sufficient competence to be able to prepare his documents himself, he can do that. What he will pay to a lawyer to do the whole process for him of course will be different from just reviewing the documents.

What does it take to register a business in Nigeria?
ABUBAKAR: Only the head office in Abuja generates an issue registration certificate. Other CAC offices were mere collection centres but since 2013, we have enabled all our offices in Kano, Kaduna, Port Harcourt, Enugu and our two Lagos offices to start and finish registration processes without request to Abuja. If you are submitting your application in Lagos, your certificate would be processed, approved, sealed and given you without it being sent to Abuja. The same applies to Kano, Port Harcourt, Kaduna and Enugu. We are at the verge of extending this direct registration services to the additional twelve offices across the country. So our plan is for customers to be able to do their transactions in their place of residence without having to come to Abuja; that is for the decentralisation.

The next target is when we do a re-architecture of the company registration portal customers will be able to do their transactions seamlessly but that is tied to the electronic stamping interface that is being developed. Once that is deployed, we will do the re-architecture of the application which will enable you to print your certificate from the comfort of your home. If you do your registration, you can upload your documents, get it approved, you have the option either to print your certificate or if you want the CAC to print your certificate for you, seal it for you and indicate the point of collection.

So, is it safe to say that one can successfully register a business within 24hours in Nigeria?
ABUBAKAR: If you are registering in any of the start to finish offices, if you submit your application today; you get your certificate within the next day. We have a 24 hour target provided your recommendation is in order.

What is responsible for the delay in registration? That is a concern for most Nigerians.
ABUBAKAR: Something we have realised is that sometimes people submit incomplete documents. Others send in unsigned documents. The law requires that the directors must sign their consent and the memorandum and articles have to be signed by all the subscribers. In addition, all the forms have to be signed by a director. Sometimes, documents are presented without being duly signed. We also require a recognized form of identification for each of the directors and shareholders because in the past, people used fictitious names to register companies. Some have used names of unborn children to register companies. So with the requirement for a recognised form of identification it enables us to confirm the identity of the person behind the company and whether he is actually qualified to be a shareholder or a director because the law requires that to be a director you must be at least eighteen years of age.

How do you go about verifying genuine businesses?
ABUBAKAR: Any person that wants to deal with any company in Nigeria will be able to know whether that company is actually registered. He can get this basic information about that company whether it is actually registered, its address and its date of registration. It helps people to do due diligence. If you need proper information about the company then you have to pay the site fee and get the results.

As part of the re-architecture of our application, we want to upload images of the company information including all the relevant forms and articles to enable people view the information. If you want a certified copy, you pay and we give you the electronic certified copies. This is being developed, it is not something that is currently in place. These are some of the things that we are trying to introduce within the next six months.