Lawyers have called for strong legal regimes and frameworks to regulate the operation of the cash-less policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
They made the call at the two-day conference on Nigeria transiting to a cash-less society: Possibilities and challenges organised by the CBN in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Justice, Federal Ministry of Communication Technology, Lagos State Government, Globacom Nigeria Plc, MTN Nigeria and Ecobank.
Speaking on The legal framework: Creating an appropriate regulatory environment for electronic and mobile commerce, Henrietta E. Abraham, a United Kingdom-based lawyer, considered how to develop effective and evidence-based regulatory oversight and what an appropriate regulatory framework should consist of.
Participants said consumer protection was one of the reasons for a strong legal framework and legislation to guide the policy. They said the rules of the industry needed to be certain, ascertainable and predictable, and there was also the need for consumer due diligence. These, they said, can only be balanced by legislations.
Such legislations should be flexible enough to allow stakeholders and new entrants into the marked to innovate and also allow the market to grow.
They agreed that though the CBN Act enables it to make rules for the regulation of the process, infrastructure providers, stakeholder and consumer participation need to be protected by legal regimes, which should also provide a level playing field for all. The law, they said, must be flexible enough to allow competition and growth in the industry. The laws must be tailored to the local environment, they said.
They emphasised the need for laws to guide and regulate internet trading and online transactions.
”There is the need to know at what point a contract comes in, when does a contract really come in in online transactions.
“This will enable us to address liability issues; we need to know who is liable for what and at what point the liability arises.”
The participants said such laws would clear the coast on data acquisition, collection, storage, management, verification and protection.
“There has to be a regulation to guide the sale of personal information and the use and transfer of same. Such issues as bulk SMS needs to be guided and regulated by law. Evidential issues need to be clear. For instance, if a matter is going to court, which evidence is admissible, which ones are not admissible.”
They noted that we need to know which courts have jurisdiction over such matters. Is it the Federal High Court or the state high courts? Which state high courts will exercise such jurisdiction?
They noted that the United Kingdom has a Data Protection Act, but there was not such laws in Nigeria which leaves us with the Common Law provisions to protect our rights and privacy.
The participants stated that lack of data protection laws was a big handicap and hindrance to economic development.
They noted that though the CBN Act, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) Act and other laws setting up various institutions are good because they empower such institutions to make regulations, but the regulations are only enforceable by the regulators. So, we need new laws to deal with issues that criss-cross the regulatory bodies.
Said they: “We need to be able to situate problems, challenges, industry by industry, so that we can set standards. If the standard is breached, somebody somewhere would be held liable.
“There is a need for stakeholders to sit down, identify and situate challenges and proffer the appropriate standards. Each industry can then look inwards and make rules for its own industry will situate where the liabilities will lie,” they noted.
The need for a financial ombudsman whom the consumers can easily run to in the event of rights breach was canvassed at forum.
