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Omodele Adigun
Investments and Securities Tribunal (IST), has cried out that lack of funds is robbing it of necessary infrastructure to perform its duties.
According to its executive Chairman, Siaka Isaiah Idoko-Akoh, who stated this during the occasion, despite the funding challenge, IST has been able to execute the (new office) project which was very dear to its heart. “Though it does not fully answer to our infrastructural deficits, it has, indeed, addressed it to some extent as we have , by unveiling the new office, taken that first step in a journey of thousand miles.And God helping us, we shall get to our Eldorado”, he said.As for how the illiquidity is affecting its duties , the IST boss explained that the Tribunal’s proceedings are fully automated, making for speedy trials and production of transcript of proceedings for litigants within a record time,but the paucity of funds over the years for the provision of needed infrastructure for its smooth operations has served to make this a wishful thinking.
But despite this handicap, he explained that IST has been able to set benchmarks for capital market operations by sanitising the market, influencing policies and engendering law reforms.
The IST is a specialized court for the Nigerian capital market established for the resolution of disputes arising from investments and securities transactions. Idoko-Akoh explained that matters before the Tribunal are expected to be concluded within a period of three months from the date of commencement of hearing of the substantive suit since the Tribunal is statutorily mandated to adjudicate disputes in a time responsive manner devoid of delays.
He added: “The importance of an entrenched adjudicatory framework that makes for certainty and predicability in the resolution of disputes in the development of a nation’s capital market can not be over-emphasized. It is in the realization of the essence of a legal regime that would engender investors’ confidence that the idea for the reform of the Nigerian capital market which ultimately midwived the birth of the IST. Matters before the Tribunal are resolved in flexible, cost effective, transparent and efficient manner
