By Aluta News
February 05, 2022
Foundation unveils framework for CSOs on transparency, accountability
Food Basket Foundation International (FBFI), a Non Governmental Organisation (NGO) says it has developed a framework to guide Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in Nigeria, to ensure transparency and accountability in their operations.
Ms Funmi Akinyele, Executive Director, FBFI, stated this at a Civil Society Regulatory Compendium and Interactive Web Platform Validation Metting in Abuja.
Akinyele said that the document would also help provide information on established legal and regulatory framework affecting their operations in Nigeria.
She said that the framework was created by the foundation in partnership with OSIWA, British Council, EU Agents For Citizen-Driven Transformation and Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Foundation to empower CSOs to carry out their activities effectively.
Akinyele added that the document would also provide evidence based decision-making needed for public and private interests.
She said that there would be an interactive web platform, which would house the document where CSOs could register, provide a national public directory as well as a compliance verification and support framework.
“This initiative is the CSO regulatory platform project ,it started with wanting to ensure that CSOs were quite aware of what all the statutory laws are in Nigeria because there is a complaint that CSOs don’t comply to laws.
“So, the first thing was to give information comprehensively about what CSOs are supposed to comply with and how are they supposed to comply, without all the details of the law because ignorance is not an excuse.
“So we wanted to make sure CSOs have the information and that they are able to at least start from there and then see how we could also engage regulators in making the process easier,” she said.
“Part of it is also creating the platform whereby CSOs can register ,there is a national public directory as well as a compliance framework where CSOs can be verified and certified as compliant,” Akinyele said.
Mr Jude Ilo, the Country Officer and Head of the Nigeria Office of the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), applauded the initiative adding that for CSOs to hold the government accountable, they needed to first start by holding themselves accountable .
Ilo said that sometimes people use CSOs vulnerability or their honest inadequacies to demonise them and discredit them making them look like incompetent.
“A man who does not have a better argument will go after you, and for so long, we have allowed them the opportunity to come after us.
“This is either because we are not complying with regulatory framework within which we are supposed to operate or we are not as transparent as we are supposed to be, or we are not as accountable to ourselves.
“This often times stem from ignorance honest mistake or deliberate decision not to do the right thing,’’he said.
Ilo expressed hope that the framework would help CSOs to cure the problem of ignorance of the law to know what to do and to cure the problem of capacity, to seek it how to do the right things.
Dr Iheanyi Anyahara, a Director at the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria, stressed the need for CSOs to understand the importance of financial reporting that way they would be able to voluntarily comply with all the requirements.
Anyahara said that the council was taking the issue of compliance as a developmental project to create thehabit for citizenry to freely report their finance to ensure probity, accountability and transparency.
He said that the creation of the document would lead to more partnership,more encouragement and lead to transparency because everybody on the platform would be subjecting themselves to scrutiny and this would lead to more compliance.
He urged CSOs to have a paradigm shift that regulators were not just there to sanction them but to see regulators as partners in progress.
“Financial reporting is purely for accountability and transparency, if you don’t have anything to hide ,you should be able to submit your financial statement,’’he said.
Mr Terver Ayua-Jor, the Special Assistant to the Registrar -General Cooperate Affairs Commission (CAC), said that the level of compliance by CSOs to regulations was not too encouraging.
Ayua-Jor, however, said that the commission was carrying out a lot of sensitisation to make sure that CSOs realised the importance of compliance.
“The compliance is in terms of filing annual returns, it is very important because it gives you the current status of the company whether it is doing well or not, whether it is active or not.
“So when you don’t file such returns, there are penalties,” he said.
Ms Winifred Achu-Egbuson , representative for CSOs and Youths at the European Union Delegation in Nigeria and ECOWAS ,said that the union was more interested in building the capacity of CSOs in Nigeria.
According to Achu-Egbuson, the CSO sector is the third governance sector therefore, their role in development cannot be underemphasised as it plays a very strong role in supporting government in delivering on development objectives.
“Our support through the EU Agents for Citizens-Driven Transformation for this process is to put in place all the necessary components CSOs can draw from in terms of complying to regulations.
“It is to also help in putting them in a position where they can with confidence engage government at federal and sub national levels.
“That is one of the reasons we are supporting this process through the EU Act project and also to say that our support to CSO is towards ensuring that the sector in Nigeria is strengthened.’’
Mr Idem Udoekong said that some CSOs did not know what to do in terms of compliance to laws.