By Dipo Olowookere
**As Court Okays Scheme of Arrangement
The scheme of arrangement for the demutualisation of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) has been sanctioned by a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos.
This development gives the stock exchange the authority to proceed with its journey of being a publicly owned organisation.
In March 2017, members of the NSE had approved the demutualisation scheme of the exchange at an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) held in Lagos.
This was followed by the signing of the demutualisation of the Nigerian Stock Exchange Bill into law in August 2018 and in December 2019, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of Nigeria in a No Objection letter, gave its consent to the NSE to hold the Court-Ordered Meeting (COM) and EGM that would facilitate its conversion from a not-for-profit entity limited by guarantee into a profit-making, public limited liability company owned by shareholders.
After the sanctioning of the scheme of arrangement by the court, the NSE is looking to secure the reregistration of the exchange as well as the approval of SEC.
The Chief Executive Officer of NSE, Mr Oscar Onyema, while commenting on this development, stated that, “The NSE demutualisation process is moving ahead in line with the expected sequence of events, following the conclusion of its Extraordinary General Meeting and Court Ordered Meeting (COM) in March 2020.”
“Understandably, in current circumstances, some of the legal and regulatory steps required have taken a little longer than originally expected, but today (last Friday), we have received court sanction for the results of the EGM, in particular, the scheme of arrangement and we are looking to secure the reregistration of the exchange as well as the approval of the Securities and Exchange Commission within the coming months.”
Adedapo Adesanya