The Nigerian Bar Association and the insurance industry have expressed their readiness to work together in building lawyers who can specialise in insurance laws, and to ensure the development of the underwriting in the insurance sector.
Stakeholders at the first yearly seminar of the NBA, Section on Business Law, Insurance and Pension Committee in Lagos.Chairman, Nigerian Bar Association- Section on Business Law, Olumide Akpata, said, one of the reasons why the NBA set up sections is for knowledge development and that, at the section of business law, the mandate essentially is to improve the practice and standard of commercial law in Nigeria.
“As commercial lawyers, we operate with our economy, we advice operators of the economy in different sectors, and at the sector of business laws, we have about 18 committees and these committees are set up along business lines, including insurance,” he said.
He said that the seminar will help the lawyers understand the insurance sector, as well as the challenges the lawyers face.“We are interested in providing sophisticated legal services, and in future, we want to find lawyers who are insurance experts because we don’t have many of them now,” he said.
Head of Legal/Company Secretary, National Insurance Commission, Dr. Talmiz Usman, said NAICOM will continue to introduce initiatives to develop the insurance sector, and engage in partnerships with other sectors to grow insurance in the country.
Committee Chairman on Insurance and Pension, NBA-SBL, Mr. Dominic Ichaba, said that as lawyers, they were interested in providing legal solutions to the insurance industry but that if the insurance industry is not big, they won’t have much to do.
He said, “we are dealing with the topic of insurance penetration because the more insurance develops, the more we have business to do. It will benefit the economy because insurance is good for all of us.”
Executive Director, Leadway Assurance Company Limited, Ms. Adetola Adegbayi, said there is need for lawyers to ensure that insurance companies live up to their obligations because if insurance companies do not live up to expectations, they do not have the right to call themselves insurers.
“As they begin to do that, the question of charging below tariff price will soon disappear because if you don’t charge the right price, and the liability crystalises and you need to pay claims, you know you can’t hide, you will do the right thing,” she said.
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