•Warns defaulters of possible account freeze by January end
The Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), Garba Abubakar, has revealed that despite an inherited liability of over N6 billion, the commission was still able to remit over N2.7 billion of its operating surplus into the Federal Government’s Consolidation Revenue Fund.
Abubarkar said: “I inherited a liability of N6 billion as outstanding pension arrears, taxes and other statutory debts when I took over as the Registrar-General of CAC in January 2020.”
He added that, “I am pleased to announce that as at today, over 85 percent of these liabilities have been discharged. We have paid up pension arrears from 2017-March 2019. We could not pay from February 2019 – December 2020, because the budget did not accommodate it, and we intend to pay the difference this year.
“For the 2019, all contributory pensions due to staff have been cleared. We have also settled our tax obligations that were over N1.2 billion; we were able to pay about N700 million and got a discount of N500 million – N600million.”
Abubarkar made the disclosure Monday, in Abuja, while answering questions from journalists on the purported protest against poor staff conditions slated for tomorrow by the CAC Junior staff Union.
According to him, the commission was able to pay over N2.7 billion operating surplus to the Consolidation Revenues, adding that but for the initial liabilities, it would have been able to pay as much as N5 billion operating surplus.
He said the commission was able to achieve the feat by blocking, wastes and sharp practices that previously engulfed the system, with the introduction of online company registration.
He charged all CAC customers to revalidate their companies’ accounts before the end of March 2021. He explained, “Moving forward, every accredited customer must come forward for the revalidation of their accounts before the end of March 2020. This has become necessary because the Commission recognizes the fact that some customers have died, changed their addresses, or changed their locations without informing the commission; some have even given their accounts to others to manage for them.”
He warned that failure to comply will lead to severe sanctions such as closure of such accounts. On staff welfare, Abubarkar said some of these achievements would not have been possible but for the cooperation, conscious and deliberate policies instituted by management.
“It is gladdening to note that the Commission conducted two different promotions for staff in 2020. The promotion was aimed at ensuring that staff were compensated for not writing their promotion examinations for 2019 and 2020. As I speak with you, over 258 staff have been promoted for 2019, while 190 were promoted for 2020,” said.
