FG launches online business registration, e-payment portal next week

Efforts to reduce the cost of doing busi­ness have re­ceived the needed boost as the Federal Govern­ment has concluded plans to launch the on­line business registration and electronic payment portal next week.

Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Mr. Olusegun Aganga, disclosed this yesterday while featuring on Chan­nels Television Business Morning.

''But the only bottleneck we are trying to sort out is the stamp duty payment. So that payment is just done at a single location. We and the World Bank are actually working on this,'' he said.

Aganga said business registration takes 24 hours in Lagos, Port-Harcourt and Kano, adding that the launch of the online busi­ness registration portal and e-payment system platform, would enable in­vestors register their busi­nesses anywhere in world.

On the cost of business registration, the Minister said President Goodluck Jonathan, had last year Oc­tober approved a proposal from his office to reduce the cost of doing business, adding that, that has now been approved.

Aganga explained that all these efforts are already contained in Nigeria's In­dustrial Revolution Plan (NIRP), which seeks to help diversify the coun­try's economy and its re­sources, explaining that all the country was embarking on now is a commodity-based industrial revolution where it has competitive and comparative advan­tage.

As part of efforts to achieve the plan, he said government was address­ing several enablers that would bring the plan to fruition, stating that access to cheap finance was one area that government was already working on as well as infrastructure growth and industrial skills.

Aganga had last year said the online registra­tion would help to reduce the cost of doing business significantly as well as the time it takes for lo­cal and foreign investors to set up their businesses. 'We are hoping to have electronic registration of companies and this will commence from October 1, 2014.“ “Since the launch of 24-hour business regis­tration in July 2012, 35,902 companies have been reg­istered within 24 hours. So far, we have achieved a 10 per cent increase in the number of companies registered, and an increase of 33 per cent in business names registered includ­ing 42 per cent increase in incorporated trustees.” 'We hope to ensure that from that date, Nigerians would no longer have to incur other extra costs and inconveniences to travel to CAC office to register and wait for a long pe­riod of time before they register their business. 'That will bring the cost and the time of setting up businesses down signifi­cantly in this country. This is the first time Nigeria will have an online elec­tronic system,' the Minis­ter had said.