CIPA/BAOA sign

Companies and Intellectual Property Authority (CIPA) has partnered with the Botswana Accountancy Oversight Authority (BAOA) to ensure adherence and compliance of provisions within the Companies Act that relates to financial preparation and reporting.

The two state-owned organisations signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) yesterday as a way to build a well structured and formalised approach to dealing with issues of non-compliance to financial reporting by companies as set out under the requirements of both the Companies Act and the Financial Reporting Act. Speaking during the signing ceremony, CIPA Registrar General, Conductor Masena said it is essential to work closely with BAOA because companies, depending on their size and form are required to register financial statements and annual reports with CIPA.

“The financial statements should then be audited and should conform to International Financial Reporting Standards. CIPA is not an expert authority on the subject of financial reporting, we will rely on BAOA for guidance and provision of relevant information relating to financial reporting,” said Masena He said this makes the partnership critical especially at a time where CIPA is on the verge of transiting from manual to electronic registration of companies and business names.

The partnership will allow both organisations to provide training, as well as information sharing regarding their specific products and service offerings to officers from both sides. BAOA Chief Executive, Duncan Majinda said the partnership is one of their efforts to improving ease of doing business in Botswana. “The MoU introduces a very important concept in doing business called one-stop-shop and through this signing we will have both our services under one room,” said Majinda. BAOA was established by the Financial Reporting Act of 2010 with an objective to provide oversight to the accounting and auditing services as well as promote standards, quality and credibility of providing financial and non-financial information by entities.