Nigeria Content Online

Some operators in
our nation’s capital market yesterday commended the courage of the
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to wield the big stick against
the former Director General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), Ndi
Okereke-Onyuike, and the former council president, Aliko Dangote.

Emeka Nwosu,
President, Independent, Shareholders Association of Nigeria (ISAN),
said the removal will restore investors’ confidence in the capital
market. Tope Fasua, managing director of an Abuja-based capital market
management firm, Global Analytic Consulting, described the removal of
the two as a positive development and a breath of fresh air for
investors.

“Ndi
Okereke-Onyuike’s exit, in particular, would mark a new beginning for
the nation’s capital market,” Mr Fasua said. “In situations like we
have in the market, where investors lost investments valued at several
billions of naira as a result of clear instances of manipulation of the
market by managers, it is good to clear the table and start afresh,” he
said on telephone from Dubai.

On steps to restore
confidence, Mr Fasua urged Nigerians not to expect the recovery of the
market in the short term, rather he advised investors to begin to think
in the long term, to allow enough time for the rehabilitation of the
market. “This will afford major investors – major oil companies,
telecoms operators – enough time for re-education on how the market is
going to work to attract more liquidity to the market,” he explained.

Esan Ogunleye, a
former registrar of the Nigerian Institute of Bankers (NIB), also said
the decision will boost the country’s risk and credit ratings as well
as the status and stature of the capital market.

Describing the
decision as long overdue, Mr Ogunleye said, over the last one year,
investor confidence has been on a downward trend, though it stabilised
briefly in the first quarter of this year. “After that, despite a loss
of two to three per cent in the capital market, it rose gradually and
flattened towards the end of that quarter, after recovering between 20
to 30 per cent capacity. Ever since, it has been spikes and falling.
With the sack, one can imagine what the investor confidence would be,”
he noted.