The blockchain company, FlintAPI Limited, whose application for company registration in Nigeria was queried for being a blockchain company has now been registered by the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC). This latest development was the intervention of the Registrar-General of CAC, Alhaji Garba Abubakar.
Apparently, the gathering public complaints and media attention over CAC’s query of the blockchain company’s application may have gotten the attention of the Registrar-General of CAC.
In our earlier report, we reported that CAC queried the registration of a blockchain company in Nigeria on the premise by CAC that “[b]lockchain is yet to be recognised by Nigerian governmentā. The applicant, FlintAPI, was required by CAC to “kindly expunge” the word ‘blockchain’ from its application. This came to Nigerians as a shock, raising questions about Nigeria’s commitment to the ease of business and growing the country’s digital economy.
Muhammad Abdullahi, Techncial Assistant to Registrar-General of CAC, reached out to Adedeji Owonibi, Founder/COO at Convexity and Senior Partner at A&D Forensics, via a LinkedIn comment, requesting the availability code of the to-be-registered company. About six hours after receiving the availability code, Mr. Abdullahi informed Mr. Owonibi that his blockchain company has been registered:
Adedeji Owonibi Your application has been registered with RC 1852282. Thanks for reaching out. However, this type of matter should be escalated through the channels provided by the Commission.
Pointing out that the channels provided were used but without result, Mr. Owonibi thanked the CAC for the swift action.
The blockchain company registration has also been confirmed by Charles Okaformbah, Co-Founder at Convexity via his LinkedIn page:
Meanwhile, the CAC staff member involved has been reportedly queried by the management for wrongly querying the blockchain company’s application.
The blockchain company’s incorporation certificate (electronic) has been issued by the CAC to the blockchain company. The CAC’s swift action on the matter has been commended. It is expected that FlintAPI Limited will now operate its blockchain business legitimately and freely in Nigeria. FlintAPI is a multichain blockchain API for game developers and marketplace to mint and reward their users with NFT and ingame assets.
This latest development is a relief to Nigerian innovators, particularly players in Nigeria’s emerging blockchain industry whose access to banking and financial services for the purpose of crypto-related transactions is already restricted under the current Central Bank of Nigeria cryptocurrency directive.
In order to completely douse fears and remove all doubts, will the CAC issue a public statement on its position on the status of blockchain companies in Nigeria’s corporate affairs? In view of the growing apprehension as a number of Nigerian and foreign innovators increasingly find other jurisdictions considered safer for their blockchain businesses, it sounds like the wise thing to do, doesn’t it?
