Bimbola Oyesola
Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA) has charged the Federal Government to develop friendly laws and policies that would ensure continuous existence of businesses.
The employers’ body said through that, government would be able to avoid inconsistencies in policies, improve corporate and firm performance.
President of NECA, Larry Ettah, urged the federal and state governments to remain focused on ensuring broad-based economic recovery that will ensure improved economic activity across most economic sectors.
Similarly, NECA also appealed that businesses should not be strangulated out of existence through multiple taxes and levies from the three tiers of government.
The association also reminded President Muhammadu Buhari not to sign the Federal Competition and Customer Protection Bill into law as a result of insertion of a tax of 0.5 percentage of profit on business to fund a new commission/agency.
Meanwhile, the association expressed worry over lateness and outright non-reconstitution of some boards, which it said portends danger for good governance with negative image for the country.
The NECA president said of greater concern to businesses is the non-reconstitution of critical boards such as the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund (NSITF), National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), Pension Commission (PENCOM), Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), among others.
“We had expected government to have set up the boards by now,” he said.
Among other issues discussed is the recurrent delay in the passage of national budgets, which NECA said is capable of slowing down the development of Nigeria. He said, “the 2018 Budget was supposed to address the significant issues of infrastructure investment and employment generation.
“We wish to appeal to both the legislative and executive arms of government to mutually agree on a time frame that would ensure that the budget for the following year is passed into law before the end of every current fiscal year.”