Business
NIPC Seeks Better Funding For Investment Centre
The Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) on Tuesday called for more funding of the One Stop Investment Centre (OSIC).
The Director of OSIC, Mr Amos Sakaba, told newsmen in Abuja that OSIC needed to be better funded by government to provide better services.
OSIC is the investment facilitation centre in NIPC where government agencies are brought together to offer services to investors.
Sakaba said more funding was needed for OSIC as it does not charge fees for its services.
“Because we don’t charge for our services, this has put a lot of pressure on us,’’ he added.
He urged government to give consideration to the centre in each year’s budget because of the peculiarity of its services.
Sakaba said OSIC had been helping to reduce the usual bureaucracy faced by investors in doing business in the country.
He said OSIC had been instrumental to shortening and simplifying administrative procedures for the issuance of business approvals, permits, licenses and company incorporation.
This, he said, had helped to remove the bottlenecks faced by investors in establishing businesses as well as reduction in the cost of doing business.
Sakaba said NIPC had concluded plans for regional investment outfits such as Odu’a Investment Company and New Nigeria Development Company to be represented at the centre.
He said this would enable investors have complete information on investment opportunities available in the regions where the companies are located.
The OSIC boss, however, lamented that the eastern part of the country, which is highly industrialised, has no regional business organisation.
The director said the commission had been working on setting up a similar centre in some states in the country.
Reports say that OSIC, which was established in 2006, has 18 agencies.
They include the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), Nigeria Immigration Service, Nigeria Customs, Federal Inland Revenue Service and the National Office for Technical Acquisition and Promotion.
Others are the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), National Bureau of Statistics, Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency and NAFDAC.