FRC To Companies: Submit Your Governance Reports Online

The Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRC), has directed companies to submit their Nigerian Code of Corporate Governance (NCCG) 2018 online through its web portal.

In a statement addressed to members of the public, FRC said the concerned organisations included all public companies and their holding companies, concessioned/privatised companies, regulated private companies as defined in the Regulation to NCCG 2018 (“entities”).

“The web portal is developed to further enhance ease of doing business, reduction of cost, time, and effort taken to comply with NCCG 2018, and serve as a repository for investors, researchers, and other stakeholders to gather and generate corporate governance information on Nigerian entities in both the private and public sectors,” the statement read.

The council said it had issued guidance to assist firms to use the portal seamlessly.

The statement continued, “The go-live date for the portal is March 22, 2022. With effect from this date, the NCCG 2018 Compliance Reporting Web Portal can be accessed at the council website.”

“With effect from this date, the council will neither accept physical hard copies nor emails for the NCCG 2018 compliance report.

“The deadline for NCCG 2018 compliance reporting for entities with year-end December 31, 2021, is hereby extended by 1 month to April 30, 2022.”

It added that the deadline for reporting on compliance with NCCG 2018 remains three months after the year-end of the company.

What you should know

The FRC released the NCCG code on January 15, 2019, highlighting key principles that seek to institutionalise corporate governance best practices in Nigerian companies.

• Section 2 of the Code empowers its users to determine the size and composition of their boards taking into account the scale and complexity of their operations; the need for sufficient members to serve on its
  committees; the need to secure quorum at meetings; as well as ensuring diversity.
• The Code also recommends an appropriate mix of executive (EDs), non-executive (NEDs), and independent non-executive members, (INEDS) with a majority of non-executive directors. However, the Code does not specify the number of INEDs required on boards but recommends that majority of the NEDs be INEDs.