Tunji-Ojo, Kemi Nandap to receive awards for supporting cooperative societies

The Cooperative Rating and Award Society of Nigeria (CRASoN) will honour Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, minister of interior and other Nigerians for supporting the growth of cooperative societies.

Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, Victor Oyegoke, president of CRASoN, said Tunji-Ojo and others shortlisted for the award will be honoured at the Nigerian National Cooperative awards, symposium and exhibitions, which will be held in Abuja on Saturday.

Among those who will receive an award are Kemi Nandap, comptroller-general of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS); Ahmed Audi, commandant-general of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC); Aliyu Abdullahi, minister of state for agriculture and food security; and Adebayo Ogungbangbe, Osun state commissioner for cooperatives and empowerment.

Others are Lydia Dauda, the deputy comptroller-general and general manager of NIS Cooperative Society Ltd; Folashade Ambrose-Medebem, Lagos state commissioner for commerce, cooperative, trade, and investment; Adegboyega Olasunkanmi, manager of NIS Staff Multipurpose Cooperative Society (NIMCOS); and Zulikha Ibraheem, Lagos state director of cooperatives.

Oyegoke said President Bola Tinubu’s administration is supporting CRASoN to identify the challenges facing cooperative societies in the country and provide the required assistance.

“There are the four challenges that we have discovered in Nigeria facing cooperative societies,” he said.

“The issue of comprehensive data. Cooperatives in Nigeria don’t really have comprehensive data that you can relate to.

“Cooperatives are a major contributor to the economy.

“All over the world, it has been proven and tried by economists to see that cooperatives are really a veritable tool to alleviate poverty among the masses.

“All over the world, just 300 cooperative societies out of the over three million that were registered by the International Alliance have over 2.1 trillion US dollars in assets.

“Just the size of the largest 7th economy in the world.

“In Nigeria, cooperatives are on the concurrent list. Each state has the power to legislate regarding cooperatives.

“There is a department of cooperative societies where you register cooperatives. You don’t register cooperative with CAC.”

Oyegoke said CRASoN is working with state governments to track the number of existing cooperative societies.

“In the 36 states, we get data to address the issue of lack of comprehensive data. We have a platform called CoopCOUNT and CoopCHECK,” he said.

“The platform tries to get data from all the states. The directors of cooperatives in each state are the custodians of cooperatives within their states.

“They are responsible for registering all cooperatives within that state. They have all the comprehensive data. So, we pick from all the states and aggregate them.

“Today, we have over 400,000 cooperatives. But what we discovered is that some of them are dormant.”

Oyegoke said the federal government is supporting cooperative societies, especially the agric-based ones with inputs such as fertilisers, seedlings, and pesticides.