KEY PROVISIONS OF THE BUSINESS FACILITATION (MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS) ACT, 2023.

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President Muhammadu Buhari signed the Business Facilitation ( (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2023,  into law on February 13, 2023. The purpose of this law is to consolidate and reaffirm the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council ( PEBEC) role in removing unnecessary bottlenecks in MDAs.
The Schedule of the Act has amended the following laws:
The Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020,
Customs and Excise Management Act.
The Nigerian Export Promotion Council Act
The Export Prohibition Act
The Financial Reporting Council Act
The Foreign Exchange (Monitoring and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act
The Immigration Act
The Industrial Inspectorate Act
The Industrial Training Fund Act
The Investment and Securities Act
The National Housing Fund Act
The National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion Act
The National Planning Commission Act
The Nigerian Customs Service Board Act
The Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission Act
The Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Content Development Act
The Nigerian Ports Authority Act
Patents and Design Act
Pensions Reform Act
Standards Organisation of Nigeria
Trademarks Act.

We have highlighted some of the key provisions of some of the Act below:

1. National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP) Act, 2004
Every contract or agreement that a person in Nigeria enters into with a person outside of Nigeria that relates to the use of trademarks, patented inventions, the provision of technical expertise, the provision of basic or detailed engineering, etc. must be registered with NOTAP no later than 60 days of execution. In contrast, corporations in their first two years of business operation shall not be subject to late registration penalties where such contracts are registered prior to the end of their second year of company operation following the revision of this provision by the Act.

2.  Immigration Act
The Act amends Section 20 of the Immigration Act by inserting new subsections (8) and (9) that state that “entry visas to Nigeria shall be issued or rejected with reason within 48 hours of receipt of valid applications. Also, Non-Nigerians must now obtain written permission from the Comptroller General (CG) of Immigration before they can practice any profession, establish or acquire any business, or form a limited liability company.

3. Industrial Training Fund Act
The Act amends the provision of  section 6 of the ITF Act such it now requires all employers with 25 or more employees to contribute 1percent of their payroll. This provision modifies the previous position in the ITF Act, which required businesses with 5 or more employees or annual revenues of more than NGN50 million to contribute to the Fund. The Act also exempts employers, which are registered as an approved entity in any of the free trade zones, from ITF contributions.

 4. National Housing Fund
Section 4 of the National Housing Fund Act (NHF) has been amended which now mandated employees to contribute 2.5% of their monthly income to the Fund under the Act both in the private or public sector or self-employed as long as they earn at least the national minimum wage or its equivalent. As a result, an employer is required by the new Section 9 of the NHF Act to deduct 2.5% of the employee’s monthly income.


5. Industrial Inspectorate Act
The Act increased the minimum capital expenditure threshold for existing and new businesses to process and obtain a Certificate of Acceptance of Fixed Assets (CAFA) to NGN5 million.The companies will only be required to process and obtain CAFA for fixed asset additions valued at NGN5 million or more.