Company secretaries have expressed disappointment over the delay in enacting a new company law through repealing the Companies Act 1994.
"The government promulgated Chartered Secretaries Act 2010 and Chartered Secretaries Rule 2011 giving the legislative coverage to the chartered secretaries. But as a matter of disappointment, the long expected new Companies Act has not been passed yet," Shahid Farooqui, executive director and company secretary of Ibn Sina Pharmaceutical Industry Limited told a programme on Saturday.
He said that an initiative was taken by the government - a high-level committee was formed and consultants were appointed. But the actual hindrance to formulate and promulgate the new law is not clear, he added.
The company secretaries demanded synchronisation of the Chartered Secretaries Act 2010 with other relevant legislations to ensure better performance of the company secretaries.
They, however, noted that the corporate governance in the country is still at development stage and the quality of professionalism is poor across the board despite significant economic progress.
They made the observations at the inaugural session of the seventh national convention and 7th convocation 2018 of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries of Bangladesh (ICSB) in the city.
Former adviser to a caretaker government Hossain Zillur Rahman was present as the chief guest at the inaugural session, chaired by ICSB President Mohammad Sanaullah.
The theme of the event was 'Chartered Secretaries: Effective Utilisation of Professional Expertise Through Legislations'.
There were two technical sessions where two papers were presented - one by Mr. Sanaullah on 'Empowering Chartered Secretaries Profession Through Legislation ' and another by Mr. Shahid on 'Empowering Chartered Secretaries to Ensure Good Governance '.
In his presentation, Mr. Shahid said the corporate sector is still at its initial stage. Nevertheless, awareness about the corporate governance is growing day by day. But compared to India, Thailand and Malaysia, the corporate governance in practice remained under-developed in the country, he noted.
In his presentation, Mr. Sanaullah said: "We strongly feel that the provisions of Chartered Secretaries Act 2010 need to be linked with the relevant legislations like Companies Act, Banking and Non-Banking Companies Act, Insurance Act, Income Tax Act and VAT Act."
In his speech, Mr. Hossain Zillur Rahman said the corporate world is an important driver of the economic progress. These corporate bodies are not working in a small isolated country. Rather, they are part of the global economic reality, he added.
This global economic reality has two important components - professional capacity of the corporate body and credibility vis-a-vis governance issue, he said.
The noted economist said the role of company secretaries is extremely important in promoting good governance and corporate management. "We consider governance only as a requirement. But professionalism in the governance is integrally linked," he said.
Former Senior Vice President of ICSB Bul Hasan said the commonwealth countries like U.K., Canada, Hong Kong, Australia and India have made it mandatory to appoint company secretaries in the public limited companies or in all companies. It is a timely demand that the Chartered Secretaries Act 2010 be synchronised with other legislations, he said.
At present, there is a provision for appointing company secretaries in the listed companies only. But there are hundreds of companies operating without the vital position. The chartered secretaries said that there is a growing awareness about this and young people are increasingly enrolling in the course to take up the chartered secretary career.
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