Against the backdrop of the natural and man-made disasters lurking around the country, insurance chief executives in the country have admonished Nigerians against overlooking the importance of insurance including insuring their lives.
The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Sovereign Trust Insurance Plc, Mr. Wale Onaolapo speaking with Vanguard urged Nigerians to more than ever, embrace the culture of insurance in 2011. He gave this advice at the company’s annual end-of-year party held at the Head Office in Lagos.
According to him, “Nigeria is highly blessed with so much natural and human resources which has translated into a lot of wealth creation in the form of businesses and commercial activities that we see around us in the country today but the big question is how many of these businesses have that continuity and longevity elements that insurance provide”
He asserted that there are enormous advantages in embracing insurance and making it a way of life as one can never go wrong with it.
Onaolapo commended the efforts of the National Insurance Commission, NAICOM and the Lagos State Government respectively for ensuring that Nigerians comply with compulsory insurance policies that the law of the land has identified.
These compulsory insurances include Motor Vehicle, (third party or comprehensive), Building under construction, Public buildings, Employer’s liability, Medical professional liability and Group life for all employees.
The STI boss said that Nigerians do not need to be compelled to do what will add value to their lives rather they should cultivate a proactive culture of sustaining their wealth and business concerns through a consistent insurance culture.
Also Mr Akin Ogunbiyi, Group Managing Director of Mutual Benefit Assurance said that insurance culture in the country was virtually non-existence but added that the need has come for the Nigerian populace to take insurance seriously going by the disasters flying around.
He said, “Insurance culture is virtually non-existence in Nigeria. Less than 2 per cent of commercially Insurable risks are covered by one form of insurance or the other even the commonest insurance which is the third party act which according to the law of the country gives a better leverage to road users than the comprehensive insurance, nobody does it.
Is it that the act is not there because there is no compliance or that monitoring agency are not doing their work that nobody is doing it”.
“Insurance penetration is as low as 1 per cent. Out of 150 million people living in Nigeria, less than 1 million carry one form of insurance or the other. So insurance has not really started in Nigeria and the people that patronise insurance companies that is the corporate world has been negatively affected due to the meltdown because there is no liquidity”.
Though Ogunbiyi admitted that the level of insurance culture overseas cannot be compared to Africa more especially to Nigeria but agreed that the culture was imbibed overtime with the aid of regulatory instruments availed by those countries for enforcement.” You cannot compare insurance in the developed countries with a third world economy like Nigeria.
Insurance is crucial there because their daily transactions involve insurance and insurance is part and parcel of their lives and insurance policy is also made compulsory”
Source : Vanguard
