Sunday Thomas, NAICOM Boss
BY NKECHI NAECHE-ESEZOBOR— Poised to end insurance claims fraud, predict accurate risk for underwriters and improve business growth in the insurance industry, National Insurance Commission (NAICOM), has said that the industry is working assiduously to ensure the sector parades robust data that would reposition its operations.
Speaking at the just concluded 48th conference of African Insurance Organisation (AIO), held in Nairobi, Kenya, the commissioner for Insurance, Sunday Thomas, appluded Africa Re on what it is doing in the area of developing the sector’s data.
According to him “Africa Re, is funding the second phase of NAICOM portal and it is also supporting many other markets across the continent on data. When we are done with the ongoing works, they would amount to a robust data,”
He noted that a lot has been achieved in the 50 years existence of the AIO, adding that to a large extent, in respect to conduct and nature of insurance, there is great departure from the position in the past.
He maintained that in terms of operations there is huge success compared to the position of the industry 50 years ago, stressing that modernization; technology; human capital; development capital and more have been entrenched in the industry in recent time.
He added that in terms of products availability, a lot of products have been developed in line with needs of consumers and in the area of regulation, a lot of the industry’s laws have been reviewed in the last 50 years, which could reflect modern day reality.
He said the various insurance markets within the continent, have also worked well with their governments to reposition insurance business in the past 50 years. He noted that insurance markets across the continent have benefited from government’s policies.
According him, all the compulsory insurances that are now low hanging fruits were given to the industry by the government. He added that a lot of things are going on at different levels as regards insurance in the continent, stressing that countries are changing their insurance laws,ms trussing that though the process may be slow, the sector is making tremendous progress.
On insurance penetration, Thomas maintained that NAICOM would continue to encourage insurance practitioners to explore opportunities in the retail market space.
While assuring that efforts would also be intensified to create awareness on benefits of insurance.
He stressted that the people need to know more on the benefits of insurance.
“We need to encourage and mop up individual lability. Another thing is that we have not been able to communicate the benefits of insurance to the public. Why should we be raising money for relations when a member of the family dies? That would have been done through insurance. We must begin to tell people about insurance. That would be the game changer.”
