thisday0520

More documents

Recommendations

Info

30 THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2015 BUSINESSWORLD INTERVIEW KHAN: NIGERIA’S FUEL SUBSIDY POLICY IS REGRESSIVE Your management is accused of unfair labour practices such as anti-women policy and the example of a pregnant woman who had to resume a day after child birth and then denying staff members their right to go on annual leave were cited. This is not true. NIMC Management is very labourfriendly. And I can give a few examples: We negotiated the redundancy package with the Unions in 2012, we signed an agreement with all the Unions including the ASCSN subsequently, we conducted the nationwide staff verification exercises with them each time we did it. We paid overtime, special allowances when we deployed the identity management infrastructure nationwide and we revived and provided support for the management of the staff transport scheme until they stopped running the scheme. We paid medical bills on compassionate grounds, we still run a clinic with medical doctors and sufficient drugs at the Head Office. The examples cited are a misrepresentation of facts to justify picketing NIMC by the ASCSN. Government’s employment policy is virtually the same in all MDAs and it does not discriminate against women. In the particular instant, honestly I think the Union is being unfair to Management and the lady in question. The truth is that she submitted a medical report during documentation, on resumption of duty that says she is not pregnant, But she was indeed pregnant. That is error number one. She could have been honest and Management would have said please go and have your baby and come back four months after to resume. There were such cases and we counselled them and they obeyed. To do otherwise would amount to being insensitive. Error number two is that she concealed the pregnancy for at least nine good monthsand she gave birth perhaps over the weekend and resumed the next working day. Now imagine how Management would have been vilified if anything had happened to her. So for obvious reasons we asked her to stop work, go and look after her baby and come back after four months. She did and we let her come back to work like other women who were pregnant on resumption and took our counsel, so that we all keep to the rules as best as possible. Is that anti-women policy? The same Union that applauded Management is now misrepresenting the facts to justify its action. About the annual leave issue. It is completely false. There were times when I directed that very senior people should not go on annual leave at particular times of the year. Whenever we were deploying or testing major components of the identity infrastructure I always made this clear, but not that they could not go on leave at all. However if you did not apply or were not entitled and or qualify for leave on compassionate grounds you should not go on leave. If you are being investigated it becomes very important that you should apply and obtain approval before you absent yourself from work. What of the accusation about not wanting to train and retain them? If the ASCSN is honest they will tell you we had done very well in that regard. Check the audited accounts and see how much we had spent on staff training local and abroad. Since 2008 we focused on sorting a few issues out that included retaining the trainable ones and equipping them well for the new system we have deployed. But there is something unusual in the defunct DNCR – they had the highest concentration of Executive Cadre staff in the entire public service and most people did not have the kind of qualification that fitted the restructuring and technology deployment we were doing. SAGEM of France excluded Nigerians in the core aspects of these deployment when the last ID Card Scheme was implemented. There was no sufficient requisite staff and we had to do a lot of rebuilding. We trained and absorbed those we could, provided they did not have any service records issues. Some of them were actually junior staff members inherited from DNCR. If I may ask, what do you do to a staff who did not attend any training because he or she was not around – was away in school and being paid, even went for NYSC elsewhere, got paid NYSC allowance and as a staff of DNCR/NIMC? I challenge the national ASCSN to ask each member of the local executive committee of Onyemenam the ASCSN NIMC Chapter to produce their staff service records to them for verification and make their findings public if they do not believe Management is sincere and honest. We know times are hard, we know some of them had put in years of service but do we abide in sin because grace abounds. What is the kind of institution we want to help build? I stand to be corrected, the Union has indeed been very unfair to NIMC Management, in particular the Governing Board, the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the President, honestly. What we have focused on, and if you like call it a legacy is the establishment of a National Identification System that has come to stay. Now we have moved from there, to then institute a National electronic Identity Card that has also come to stay You were talking about some awards presented to NIMC in Dubai. Can you elaborate on that please? This happened on Tuesday the 12th of May, 2015. There is this Smart Card and Payment Awards in the Middle East organised annually. It is a global event where developments in the smart cards and payment industry are assessed globally and institutions are encouraged to submit their products for assessment and evaluation. We were one of the five institutions that made the final list in our category ‘Best Payment Initiative Africa’ and NIMC clinched the award. The National e-ID Card was adjourned the most innovative African payment platform in 2014. And for us, that is an important endorsement by the global community and as I speak, a couple of countries have indicated interest over the past six -seven months to come and understudy the Commission and see what we have done and how we did it. They include Ghana, UAE, Tanzania, Kenya, etc., so we are currently blazing the trail if you like in Africa and across the world. This is because it is not that the presence of a payment solution and an electronic identity on the same plastic have not been done before, what has not been done before is having more than just those two and having it at the level of a global name like MasterCard. Typically, what people do is to have an electronic identity and a local payment solution that is not deep enough and does not help in deepening financial inclusion or access to financial credits. But the partnership we have with MasterCard meant that our Card will be acceptable in over 210 countries and anywhere and amongst any of our banks and that is beautiful and that is what made the news around the world because we were able to make the criteria set by such a global brand as well as global standards for eID Cards. What we have focused on, and if you like call it a legacy is the establishment of a National Identification System that has come to stay. Now we have moved from there, to then institute a National electronic Identity Card that has also come to stay. Now we have moved to the level of implanting the identity verification scheme that is currently being used by one of the security agencies and as soon as we have the green light, it will be deployed in all of our airports and we will begin to see the value proposition in what we have done. So we have delivered. All that is left is the scaling up of the project and it was not originally the intention of government to handle the scaling up of the project? It was supposed to be handled by the private sector SPA s appointed as concessionaires. Finally DG, how would you like to be remembered, what legacies are you leaving behind in NIMC? By the time I leave hopefully at the end of my tenure in November 2015, the most important legacy and first thanks to God and second to Mr. President who made it possible for us to serve. Electronic identification scheme for Nigeria, we have also been able to set up a straight identity verification scheme for Nigeria. My team and i will be remembered for three thing; the winding up of the defunct DNCR has been completely achieved and there is no such thing as DNCR anymore, and if you investigate properly, you will find that there are institutions that have been wound up either by policy or laws still find a way of remaining around. That is not the case with the DNCR. Second, the three decade problem old of ascertaining or deciding on how to uniquely identify Nigerians has been laid to rest and that to me is an important legacy and I am sure that my team and I will be remembered for our pioneering efforts in ensuring that there is a departure from the past ways of doing identification in Nigeria. Like I very often say, we cannot solve our problems with the same thinking that we used when we created them, that was what i learnt from the legendary Albert Einstein. The thinking we had before led to an obsession with National institutions and the private sector, focusing on card issuance as an end to its self. Sometimes there cards can be duplicated or obtained from a business centre nearby. What we have now is a system that assures and uniquely says you are who you say you are and the Commission can confirm this conclusively. In our systems, this is represented by a set of 11 digits number that cannot be duplicated and is verifiable in a secure manner. And before the numbers are issued to anyone, care would have been taken to ensure through a specific process that is repeated for every such entry of personal information that your information had not been previously entered into the system, by the use of your biometrics (face, fingerprints and as we will soon upgrade to iris), because there is a National Identity Database (NIDB) where the data is stored. That is the beauty of what we have. And you know what what, it is secure, see with a disaster recivery/ business plan and Nigerians and local firms are significantly involved. Also, the National e-ID Card is the only government ICAO compliant token whose document signeris resident and managed in Nigeria. How useful will this legacy be to Nigeria and Nigerians? Positively. This is one legacy of President Jonathan’s administration that will be useful for the incoming administration. My understanding is that the incoming administration has security, unemployment and social welfare payments as very cardinal programmes to pursue and you must first be able to ascertain who each individual is before talking about eligibility for one social welfare programme or the other. Thats why the safety Nets Projects is already tied to this NIMS project. You must be able to talk of a foundation identity before talking of a functional identity. And so, it is very central or core to any attempt at addressing security social welfare issues particularly when you want to implement social welfare programmes like paying stipends to the unemployed or other deserving citizens, payment of benefits to farmers like we are currently working to deploy with the Federal ministry of Agriculture, payment of pensions to pensioners, payment of any other social benefit to citizens and for any other government transfers. So that process of providing unique identification for ensuring that such programmes get to the targeted population is already in place. This is an important programme for all times honestly and Nigerians should be appreciative of the effort of all NIMC staff. Secondly, a foundation identity provides you with the important tool not only facilitating service delivery across the public and private sectors abut also for fighting crime. It is going to complement the works of the security agencies. I alluded to the fact that access has been given to one of the agencies that is able to use the database to verify the identity of individuals and by the time we put it to use in some of the other government agencies and even in the private sector, the rate of identity related frauds will just take a dive downwards. Also unique identity means you can count the number of unemployed and channel them through a scheme using the card and luckily there is a payment solution on it. So it helps you to organise schemes around specific programmes based on eligibility indices, which is similar to what we are currently doing with the Ministry of Agriculture.
31 THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2015 BUSINESSWORLD INSURANCE Odukhale : Retail Insurance is the Only Way to Develop Nigerian Insurance Industry Mr Oye Hassan-Odukhale is the Managing Director of Leadway Insurance LTD. In this interview with Ebere Nwoji, he spoke extensively on burning issues in the insurance industry especially the importance of developing retail insurance in Nigeria excerpts. You have just pushed a unique insurance product to the market , the Family Benefit Plus, which is a kind of funeral expenses insurance cover and in retail insurance category, what informed your effort in this direction now? Insurance is a business that you do with a large number of people. You want to make sure that you touch people. One of the things we have been accused of in Nigeria is not reaching large number of Nigerians.That is low insurance penetration in the country. You penetrate insurance better by selling the product generally to a larger number of people. Even the commissioner for insurance himself agree that we have not adequately penetrated the market. Nigeria has a population of over 175 million people so where we look at it that the market is tough, people outside Nigeria see it as opportunity because they look at the number of people we have and if you can sell products to them you know you have penetrated the market. So it is a matter of time we are looking at it also that we need to look at our backyard .There are people to reach there,I look at it that we in insurance industry , we have been a bit lazy I will be frank with you .We are not trying to reach people enough with insurance. When it comes to overall premium income of insurance industry,it is not all that bad but most of them come through commercial insurance because you can sell one policy to an organisation for a couple of millions. You need to sell probably 1000 policies to individuals to make that same level of premium and previously we had challenges of bad payments system because you want to sell in a way that you can efficiently collect your premium. Now it is getting better but we are still struggling. You Cannot say you want to post your cheque from your house to insurance company, you are not sure of the safety and if you have to use a dispatch to go and collect N2000 from Ajegunle, you know the expense of using that dispatch. So we have a lot of things that have not worked in our favour and when you use agents, some agents can be very funny and that also can affect your brand. Sometimes they will collect the premium they will not remit it to the company then you have insured that is not happy with you. So we have a lot of challenges but still is not enough reason for us not to try and take advantage of the opportunities that are just lying at our door steps in terms of market in Nigeria, but I think we are all waking up to it. Talking about retail market , your colleagues out there complain that it is expensive what is your own experience? Retail is very very expensive but is the only way out.If you don’t face it now, you have to face it some other time and it takes a while to reach a critical mass in retail but in terms of investment, it is very expensive.Now we believe in Leadway, that if we don’t do it now when will you do it because one day you have to do it. You have to look at the retail market that is a case for you.Corporate insurance with time may reduce because there are a lot of mechanisms in term of managing risks but the retail person, the man that has one car must insure that one car because that is the only car he has.But the man that has 50 cars, to insure one may be hard because he has other cars. That is how to relate cooperate to individuals. So the person that needs insurance more is the individual, am not saying cooperate don’t need insurance, they need insurance but their own insurance is more sophisticated but the basic insurance: your motor, fire, house, children ‘s education is mostly individuals but to reach them, that is why I said reaching them, collecting premium is expensive. Odukhale So what is the way forward? Am not saying because it is expensive we will not face it, yes we will face it.Now when you see some foreign companies coming to Nigeria, that is what is attracting them.They are not coming to Nigeria to insure NNPC, no they are not interested there , they are coming to Nigeria to insure people like you.That is what is attracting them.they deal with so many people with low insurance density they know it is going to be expensive initially but when you overcome it you will just be cruising but to reach that critical mass. In Nigeria,we must reach that critical mass,people must feel our impact as an industry , companies feel our impact because we pay their claims, but individuals will say insurance companies,they don’t pay claims but companies say we pay claims because we are not reaching them they are not feeling our impact enough, now if people start buying policies from insurance companies and they are getting paid or whatever, that is how the news will spread and they will share with their friends saying ah!these people are paying o!. For instance,now you buy insurance of this Family Benefit Plus and something happens to your family and you get paid and you have a smooth burial,you will tell your friends that ah! this thing worked for me and that is the best advertisement .So it will get around. So if you want to share your latest experience in terms of retail insurance what will be your opinion? There is still work in progress, we are not yet there, but we are ready to face it squarely. There is mass premium in retail insurance for instance, in corporate you con do premium of N1billion but for you to do N1 million in retail, it will take you a long time, it is a lot of policy count. You have to issue a lot of policies. But overall retail can be more profitable when you get the right number .Also it smoothens your experience.If yo are insuring one big factory now,if there is a claim, you know how much you will pay. But if you are insuring retail, how much claims can you have.Also in retail insurance, companies retain more premium because if you are insuring your car and your car is N5million, Leadway can retain it.But if Leadway is insuring a plane for $5 million Leadway cannot retain a premium of $5million . So if you pay us the premium, it is going to the reinsurance.So if you work out a premium retained in commercial insurance and retail insurance, you see that in retail insurance, you are better off.For instance, if you are a commercial insurer and you are doing a premium of N1billion you may probably retain N300million premium,am just talking of the curve but if you are a retails underwriter, if you do N1billion you may retain N900million that is the difference. Bancassurance guideline was recently released after it was suspended, what opportunities does that offer to insurance: I think what the CBN wanted to achieve was to ensure that the banks are not exposing their balance sheet to any insurance risk at all and which in some experience we have seen it about to happen or nearly happened.They want to make sure that it is very clear that the risk lies with underwriter that the banks are not exposed .I think that is the genesis of that circular to me . The CBN is saying hold on, you are a banker yes you have clients let’s study it very well ,we will allow you to expose your clients to insurance companies, but the risk rests with the insurance companies totally no risk should in any way or any form, be in your books and if things are not very clear,there can be mistakes.In Leadway we have experienced it with one bank particularly we have to accommodate the claim because it was not tidy and it was their fault and when I was talking with the MD of the bank he said wao! I did’t know this thing can create problem for us this way that was about the time Central Bank suspended it. So things can go wrong if they were not well defined and that is what CBN is trying to guard against. But there is a provision in the guideline that says banks are only limited to two insurance companies meaning that if a bank can accommodate two, insurance companies can go to a number of banks, it was not specific how many banks insurance companies can sign up to. No insurance companies can sign up with all the banks . If you are one of the two the banks want to sign up with,what they are saying is that they want the banks to be limited to two partners and I think it is just the beginning.You know when you come up with new things,you want to study it gradually and see how it goes you make it a bit tight but with time you will release it so they are just limiting the banks to two and I don’t think there is any problem with that. You don’t think it could place the banks in such a position that insurance companies will have to cluster or compete to partner with banks? No they are just saying that one bank can have not more than two insurance partners, any two insurance partners .What they are also saying is that let the banks also be able to compare not just be confined to one insurance company because there is value in competition for the consumer. So they want the banks to be able to relate with two insurance companies not just one. So I think that is what they are doing and I don’t think there is any problem with that. The first quarter results are coming in and some of the results are not too robust showing that probably the industry didn’t do well.The group life insurance ,police pension have not been paid why is the result like that ? You have said it, the premium has not been paid, and it cannot be ignored.We also know that there is a challenge in the economy. Government must set priorities for what they do but I believe that very soon they will look into that area. There have been challenges, you know our main source of foreign revenue income is oil and there is deep in the oil price so it affected everything ,it affected government revenue, you know many state governments have not paid salaries, so you want to resolve these things before you say you want to pay insurance premium.But overall every business go through turbulent times it cannot be smooth and selling every time you must go through some hard time, the economy gets through hard times, we pray that it will get better again.It cannot just be one way traffic, there may be times you have challenges in every industry. How soon do you see recovery? We have a new government coming up and we all pray that it will find solution to all these problems we are facing in the country. Look at the cue of petrol.But It is for every body not just for the insurance industry, it is for the entire economy and insurance is a reflection of what is happening in the economy we don’t create business we only insure business so if the business is not doing well, what are you going to be insuring, we are the mirror of the economy so is only when the economy is doing well that we do well also.If the economy is not doing well what are we going to be insuring. You are a major player in life insurance and pension.Both offer benefits to retiree s on the platform of annuity and programme withdrawal and Nigerians are at liberty to choose between the two, what is your experience in annuity and programme withdrawal pension market? It depends on what the insured wants. It is like you want to buy a car, you want to buy CONT’D ON NEXT PAGE
Page 1 and 2: CBN Retains Interest Rate at 13%, H
Page 3 and 4: THISDAY WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015 3
Page 7 and 8: 8 THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY , Buh
Page 11 and 12: WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015 • THISDAY
Page 13 and 14: THISDAY WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015 13 W
Page 15 and 16: THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2 01
Page 17 and 18: THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2015
Page 21 and 22: 21 FEATURES Students listen during
Page 29: THISDAY • WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2015
Page 35 and 36: THISDAY • WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015
Page 37 and 38: THISDAY • WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015
Page 39 and 40: WEDNESDAY, MAY 20, 2015 • THISDAY
Page 51 and 52: THISDAY•WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2015 WE
Page 53 and 54: B WEDNESDAY MAY20, 2015 THISDAY TEN
Page 55 and 56: D WEDNESDAY MAY20, 2015 THISDAY SHO
Page 57 and 58: F INTERNATIONAL WEDNESDAY MAY 20, 2
Page 61 and 62: Transition a nsGlory THISDAY WEDNES

thisday0520

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?