Mass Resignation hits Corporate Affairs Commission

• As staff members allege high-handedness, massive corruption and gross incompetence against Registrar General
• Code of Conduct Bureau accused of unholy alliance with Commission

 By Lillian Okenwa

As various groups and organisations petition the Presidency, National Assembly, and Code of Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) against the Registrar General (RG) of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), Alhaji Garba Abubakar, over alleged high-handedness, massive corruption, and gross incompetence, members of the Commission’s top management have been resigning in droves.

Rattled by the mass resignation, CAC in a memo dated 4th October 2021 and signed by its Director of Human Resources, Mrs. Olayemi Oyeniyi warned that the Commission would no longer accept sudden resignation without the mandatory one month or three months’ notice as stipulated in the Commission’s condition of service. The massive resignations are said to be at all levels – Directors, middle Management, and other Cadres.

However, one of the many aggrieved staff of the Commission who spoke with Law & Society under anonymity for fear of victimisation described the notice as illegal and laughable. “The above memo has been foolishly, sheepishly, blindly, and ignorantly signed. It is illegal and contrary to law, common sense, and logic; both at Common Law and Statute. In a contract of employment being a contract of personal service, nobody can force an unwilling employee to work. The memo is laughable and scandalous. One can give the statistics of the number of people that resigned during his less than 2 years tenure. The harassment and intimidation is too much.”

It is worthy of mention that during the maiden meeting between Graba Abubakar, CAC Management Team, and the Hon. Ministers of Industry, Trade and Investment, Otunba Adeniyi Adebayo and Hajiya Aisha Abubakar at the Ministry here he (The RG) was presented with his Letter of. Appointment, both Ministers cautioned Abubakar as an insider who ultimately got the job after a lot of wranglings, manipulations, and in-fightings not to “use his appointment as an opportunity to settle scores or embark on vendetta” given the bad blood that the Commission witnessed for 2 years of the vacancy of the RG position. Both Honourable Ministers offered to “carry out close oversight” functions over CAC.

The distressed staff further observed: Curiously, the same Ministers are still in Office while Abubakar is on a rampage of unprecedented vendetta hat led to the shock resignation of 4 Senior Directors within 6 months of his assumption of Office as the RG. At that maiden meeting, both Ministers indeed urged the RG to extend a “green leaf” to all and sundry upon assumption of office as RG. Sadly, less than 2 years into his tenure the Commission has since become a “theatre of vendetta and oppression” The Commission has become something else with the weapon of transfers not based on manpower needs but a tool of suppression and vindictiveness.

“In his first six months, the Directors of Administration, Finance, Procurement, Human Resources, resigned en-mass! Too many people are leaving CAC. This is the first time over 200 people are leaving an office within a year; hence the rather unwarranted illegal Circular. Besides, the decision as contained in the Circular which is contrary to the CAC Staff Conditions of Service was not discussed at any Management meeting but the unilateral decision of the RG. Besides Over 30 members of Staff who were past and present Union members and those perceived to be loyal to the Union have been transferred to different State Offices across the Country. Note that this is not based on manpower needs of the Commission but as a vendetta to destabilise the Union and its activities. In addition, any Member of Staff perceived to be loyal to the Lady Azinge led past administration was subjected to transfer out of Head Office as a means of settling scores and destabilizing such Staff.

“In the process of such malicious and vindictive transfers informed by the quest to settle personal scores, a Senior Deputy Director was recently transferred to Jalingo to Head a State Office; first in the over 3 decades history of the Commission for an Executive Staff of the rank of Deputy Director to head any State Office. He was even transferred without any relocation allowance. This is a classic case of abuse of office.”

Another insider told Law & Society that the said circular is manifestly illegal. “It is very illegal. All the things that the RG has been doing here are illegal and gross abuse of power. There was a recent judgment against him from the National Industrial Court because of a similar attitude. He doesn’t have the power to dissolve a union but he issued a circular to dissolve the Union. He consequently transferred all the Union Executives and issued a circular that none of the 28 Staff who were transferred to various States should be given any form of leave, whether annual, casual, sick leave, or otherwise until after six months. This circular has no bearing on the Conditions of Service or indeed Public Service Rules. Now that he’s seen people are resigning he issued yet another Circular that if one resigns, he/she will not get his/her benefit until next year. People still kept on resigning so he issued yet another Circular impairing on Staff options to exit. In spite of that, people are still paying money and resigning.

“From 4th October till date, over 10 people have resigned. Previously Staff used to access various forms of loans from the Cooperative Society but when he came on board he cancelled all. Cooperative Society funds have nothing to do with the Management. It belongs to the Staff. He stopped the Cooperative Society from giving Staff loans. We have a shop where if you need something, you pick and they deduct it from your salary for some months. He stopped that too. Aside from the general Cooperative Society, there is also the Muslim Cooperative Society, which he stopped from giving loans to people. The office used to give introductory letters to banks to enable people access credit facilities from banks.

“He stopped the issuance of the introductory letter. Even with mortgage loans, he stopped it. He stopped anything that could give benefit or any sort of relief to staff. Staff arrears too he refused to release. Above all, he has glorified gossiping. If you can gossip and tell him things, he’ll bring you closer to him. People now record conversations, record videos, take pictures and send to him. His boys even brag that ‘if you dare me, I will transfer you’.”

This is coming on the heels of a National Industrial Court of Nigeria’s decision which awarded damages to the tune of One Million Naira (N1, 000,000.00) against the Commission for undue interference with activities of the Staff Union, Amalgamated Union of Public Corporation Civil Service, Technical and Recreational Employees (AUPCTRE), by the CAC Management.

In a landmark judgment, the President of the National Industrial Court, Hon. Justice Benedict Kanyip, Ph.D. declared the Circular of January 11, 2021, issued by the CAC, dissolving AUPCTRE null and void and of no binding legal effect. RG Garba Abubakar had proscribed the Staff Union and transferred about 28 past and present Officials of the Union all over the Country. These are transfers not informed by manpower needs but a “scores settling” exercise. Such transfers involve hundreds of Millions of Naira…what a waste of Government meagre resources for personal vendetta! This is sad coming at a time even the Federal Government is borrowing money for public infrastructure.

As a result, the Union dragged CAC before the National Industrial Court, where Justice B. B. Kanyip declared that the decisions reached against the Union through the Circulars were arbitrary, unwarranted, oppressive, and amount to interference and violation of the Union’s right to freely associate and organize as a trade union.

Meanwhile, inside sources at CAC revealed that the Commission has a lot of Court actions against it arising from instances of impunity and abuse of power. “Such litigations”, according to the source “are very unnecessary and imposes a huge financial burden on the Commission. For instance, a former Acting RG is in Court against the CAC for acts of vendetta at the behest of the current RG. The court has just given judgment in favour of the Union over acts related to abuse of Office by the RG. Another Deputy Director is also in court against the Commission arising from personal feud and acts of abuse of power, claiming hundreds of Millions as special, general, and aggravated damages.

“These avalanche of cases are being defended by Senior Advocates of Nigeria for which the professional fees are in Millions. For an agency that is supposed to be remitting money to FG for infrastructural development to indulge in these acts of waste of public funds is no doubt ridiculous. The number of Staff that have resigned from the Commission within less than 2 years of the Garba Abubakar led Management including Directors calls for serious concern.”

Equally worrisome is what AUPCTRE, an affiliate of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC has described as a recent unholy alliance between CAC and the Code of Conduct Bureau. The group in a September 9, 2021 petition addressed to President Muhammadu Buhari and signed by its General Secretary, Comrade Waheed Sikiru, the Union alleged that it petitioned the CCB with substantial evidence against the Registrar-General.  According to him, the petition was acknowledged and when the Union was invited to defend its position, it honoured the invitation and defended the allegation, hoping that justice would be done “but this has not been addressed till date.”

He said the union was shocked beyond imagination watching the same CCB in an “unholy partnership” with CAC on issues of fighting corruption in the country in spite of numerous corruption allegations hanging on the neck of the Registrar- General of CAC that have not been addressed by the CCB. AUPCTRE then urged President Buhari to intervene speedily to save the soul of CAC, employees, and the nation, while also appealing for an investigation into the unholy and less than transparent partnership between CCB and CAC.

On September 5, 2021, Prof. Muhammad Isah, Chairman of the CCB paid a courtesy visit to the Commission. The RG/CEO of the Commission, Garba Abubakar while receiving him said CAC will grant the CCB access to its database to enable it to carry out seamless investigations of companies involved in illicit activities.

Faulting the visit, a CAC insider said: “There are pending petitions against the RG and they came to pay him a courtesy call. For what reason? Look at the timing. We don’t even have any synergy with them like the EFCC and other investigative agencies that when they need access to our data we allow them access. He now claims that he wants to give them access to our database. We’ve not been receiving applications from them for an investigation like other agencies we normally partner with. We receive hundreds from EFCC, ICPC, and DSS. They would have been the one that needs access with the CAC database, not people we don’t have any relationship with. It’s only now that there are pending unresolved petitions against the RG that we’re suddenly seeing this collaboration. Now his boys are bragging that the Code of Conduct Bureau has been settled so nothing will happen. The report of the meeting arising from the petition against him is currently before the Chairman Code of Conduct Bureau who is supposed to forward same to the Chairman of the Tribunal but it’s clear he’s not likely to do that. Otherwise, how do you explain this type of courtesy visit?”

Another area of concern according to insiders is the Structure of CAC Management. For instance, the CAC has only the RG as the CEO and the only executive member of the Board. There are no Executive Directors to check the excesses of any RG. The Board members are mere ex-officio members and representatives of professional bodies like NBA, ICAN, MAN, NACCIMA, FMOJ, FMITI, and a Chairman who are all part-time members of the Board. There is therefore no corporate governance for such a critical supervisory and regulatory body.

This is a serious lacuna on the part of the Legislature. A regulatory and supervisory institution like CAC should have a sound corporate governance structure like CBN that has Deputy Governors on its Board who also works at the apex Bank on full time; with executive powers, and members of the Management/Board. Other critical supervisory agencies like NDIC have executive directors to checkmate arbitrary use of power by the CEO. This lacuna has become obvious as a result of the excesses and impunity of the current RG. Perhaps, all the previous RGs exercised caution and were not that lawless and reckless with power. The prevailing impunity has never been the case in the helms of affairs of the over 31 years of the institution.

This according to an insider “is not the case at CAC at all. The RG is more of a Sole Administrator. The Heads of Department/Directors hardly have the opportunity to contribute to what I’d call mock Management meetings. The RG as sole Administrator intimidates and ridicules all the Directors through autocratic policies such as withdrawing officially attached cars to the Directors. During meetings, nobody contributes. The RG simply dishes instructions to Directors like school children. This is unhealthy for such a sensitive organisation with its enormous powers and far-reaching responsibilities under the CAMA 2020. The leadership attitude of the current RG led to the resignation of four Directors within 6 months of his tenure between February and July 2020. Most of the remaining Directors are only marking their times to retire and go. The Commission has become a witch-hunting arena, such that once the RG does not like your face or your state of origin you are a subject of transfer outside the Head Office.

“Perhaps one reason why the RG is very reckless in running the Commission aground is that he has no stake in the future of the Commission. Upon his appointment as RG he terminated his public service career with the Commission and within one week of assumption of duties; immediately collected his gratuity of over N55 million. Therefore, whatever happens to the Commission including the inability to pay gratuity to retiring staff does not bother him. Of late, the RG even threatened to stop payment of gratuity entirely after collecting his full gratuity!!”

Meanwhile, the House Committee on Finance has threatened to shut down CAC for having a higher expenditure than it generated revenue between 2016 to 2021. The panel also asked the Budget Office to suspend the budgetary approval for the commission until the Commission presents reports of all expenditures. At the interactive session on the 2022-2024 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) organised by the committee, James Faleke, chairman of the panel, questioned Abubakar, on its operational expenditure.

Accused amongst other things of having scant regards to Civil Service Rules to the point of approving payments far beyond his statutory threshold limit of N2.5m, the Commission on 15th March 2021, appointed a legal firm, of a top Senior Advocate of Nigeria to represent it in two cases by the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and Socio-Economic Rights & Accountability Project (SERAP) contesting certain sections of the new Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020. The firm forwarded an acceptance letter dated 17th March 2021 requesting for N25.5m as professional and filing fees, on the 18th March 2021 the letter was processed and approval given in effect where the sum of N11m as 50% part payment was eventually paid to the firm.

Documents made available to Law & Society showed that Abubakar paid the legal fees far above his approval threshold going by a 14 January 2016 Circular signed by the then Secretary to the Government of the Federation Babachir Lawal. It was also alleged that he has been making that kind of illegal approval beyond his approval threshold with impunity.