Pan-African financial services group, United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc, has added the Corporate Citizens Award to its long list of national and international laurels.

UBA won in the Extensive Compliance Category at the maiden edition of the awards ceremony organised by Nigeria’s Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel, Abuja.

The Corporate Citizens Award is open to all registered companies in Nigeria and seeks to promote the culture of good corporate governance in the Nigerian environment by recognising corporate citizens who have conducted their affairs in compliance with statutory requirements and best practices.

“The idea behind this initiative is to recognize performance and reward corporate excellence among companies operating in Nigeria, with the ultimate goal of improving our rating in the global competitiveness index,” said Otunba Funso Lawal, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Commission in his remarks at the ceremony.

To be eligible for consideration, companies must have complied with the requirements of the Companies and Allied Matters Act and respective industry statutes and regulations. Apart from impacting on their respective industries positively they are expected to have performed creditably well in corporate social responsibility.

Specifically, the independent panel of judges under the Chairmanship of Dr. Christopher Kolade, former Nigerian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, looked at financial management, work place environment, management of stakeholder relations, innovation, corporate social responsibility, industry leadership as well as corporate governance to select winners. Twenty-six companies including UBA made the final list from over 800 companies that were considered and we were one of the nine winners that eventually emerged.

Mr. Olusegun Aganga, Minister for Commerce and Industry, who represented President Goodluck Jonathan at the event, commended all the companies who received awards while encouraging those who did not win to imbibe the best practices of the companies that won. He noted that the awards will provoke commitment to best business practices among companies in Nigeria and expressed happiness that this is coming at a time the current government’s transformation agenda is blossoming.

Welcoming the recognition to the bank, Phillips Oduoza, Group Managing Director and CEO UBA Plc, said the award reaffirms the bank’s commitment to best practices in the way it does its business across the continent.

“We operate in multi-jurisdictions given that we have presence in 19 African countries and three international financial centres; London, New York and Paris. We are thus committed to higher standards in regulatory compliance in the interest of our stakeholders and customers,” Oduoza said.

•Photo shows Dan Okeke, Executive Director, UBA (left) receiving the Best in ‘Extensive Compliance Category’ Award from Otunba Funsho Lawal, Chairman of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) during the maiden awards ceremony organised by the CAC in Abuja recently.