The Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, has announced sweeping digital reforms aimed at eliminating the delays that have long plagued business registration and service delivery in Nigeria.
Speaking at the CAC Stakeholders’ Forum in Kano on Monday, Registrar-General Hussaini Ishaq-Magaji, SAN, said the commission was determined to restore efficiency through new technology-driven solutions.
The forum brought together legal practitioners, entrepreneurs, anti-corruption agencies such as the EFCC and ICPC, and other stakeholders to review challenges and assess ongoing reforms.
Ishaq-Magaji explained that the commission inherited an overstretched registration portal that could not handle rising demands, particularly after the introduction of compliance initiatives such as mandatory registration of Point-of-Sale businesses and the filing of annual returns.
This, he said, created heavy backlogs and placed enormous pressure on customers and staff.
“Our call centre and operational departments receive no fewer than 3,000 emails every day, with fewer than 100 staff available to attend to them. This model is not sustainable and unfair to both our customers and staff. That is why we resolved to change it for good,” he said.
To tackle the problem, the CAC introduced an Artificial Intelligence-powered portal in June. The new system can automatically read, categorize, and route thousands of customer requests within seconds.
According to Ishaq-Magaji, the AI reform has already achieved a major milestone by reducing the time required for business name registration to less than 10 minutes.
“Anywhere you are, without knowing anyone in CAC or paying a middleman, you can now register a business name and get your certificate instantly in less than 10 minutes. That is the new Nigeria we are building,” he declared.
Despite the breakthrough, Ishaq-Magaji admitted that not all challenges have been resolved. Services such as the registration of limited liability companies and incorporated trustees are still experiencing delays, with more than 7,000 pending applications being handled by only 63 registry staff.
He, however, assured stakeholders that additional phases of the digital reform would address these gaps and significantly improve turnaround times.
ALSO READ: CAC launches AI portal for faster registration
“The future of the CAC lies in technology. We are determined to expand our reforms until every customer can access our services with speed, transparency, and fairness,” he said.
The commission’s reforms have already drawn praise from professional bodies. Ahmed Abubakar, Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Ungogo branch, described the reforms as a “remarkable achievement” that would improve the ease of doing business in Nigeria. Similarly, NBA Kano branch Chairman, Usman Umar-Fari, urged the CAC not only to sustain the reforms but also to encourage companies to take their corporate social responsibilities seriously while creating more opportunities for legal practitioners.
The CAC’s ongoing digital transformation is expected to play a critical role in strengthening Nigeria’s business environment, promoting transparency, and reducing opportunities for corruption by eliminating middlemen in the registration process.
NAN
