The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), has given Stakeholders in Blockchain Technology Association of Nigeria (SiBAN) a two-week ultimatum to work out its leadership crisis or all official dealings between the association and the government will cease.
According to Chimezie Chuta, Chairman of the National Blockchain Policy Implementation Steering Committee at NITDA, SiBAN is expected to develop a peace plan or risk losing formal government recognition.
The deadline, which started a week ago, leaves the association with less than a week to reach a consensus.
The back story
In September 2024, SiBAN Board of Trustees (BoT) announced that Obinna Iwuno, who took office as president in December 2022, had been expelled from the group along with his associates.
The board cited “numerous violations of trust and governance principles” as the reason for removal.
However, Iwuno released a statement on the same day informing SiBAN members that SiBAN is now registered and trademarked and that legal action has been taken against people trying to disrupt the peace of the association.
While SiBAN BoT expelled Iwuno from office in September 2024, they had suspended him since May 2024.
The reason for his suspension includes allegations such as multiple breaches of trust and financial mismanagement.
After the suspension, a caretaker committee was appointed to take charge of the operations of the association. At the same time, Iwuno continued to act as the President of SiBAN granting media interviews and attending events.
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Consequently, the association broke into two factions, one led by Iwuno and one led by the caretaker committee. This made government engagements difficult as both factions met with the government on similar issues separately.
In his response to questions by Techpoint Africa, Iwuno said there is no crisis in SiBAN. “the Executive Council and members of the Board of Trustees are running the association seamlessly meeting various critical stakeholders in the ecosystem.”
However, one of the BoT, Senator Ihenyen, who was also the former SiBAN President said that under Iwuno, one of the the vice presidents (the executive secretary) resigned in May 2024 after submitting a petition of abuse of power and mismanagement against the president.
That resignation was followed by another three people who make up the six-man executive council of SiBAN leaving Iwuno and Emeka Ezike (vice President, Media and Publicity) as the only members of SiBAN executive council.
“That makes the executive council automatically dissolved. No two persons can represent the entire association,” Ihenyen said.
This was why the BoT created a caretaker committee to run the affairs of the association while Iwuno was suspended. But Iwuno continued to act as President of SiBAN and the BoT expelled him.
Meanwhile, Iwuno calls this expulsion “a joke taken too far by a faceless group.”
Referring to the BoT, he said their aim is to “establish a shadow administration that operates behind the scenes, accommodate fraudulent activities, with a president serving as a mere figurehead.”
In one report Iwuno said fraudulent meme coin creators in Nigeria are responsible for the disruption of the association.
While he maintains that he’s the president of SiBAN, other blockchain bodies such as the Blockchain Nigeria User Group (BNUG) and Blockchain Industry Coordinating Committee of Nigeria (BICCoN) have issued statements that they do not recognise him as the president.
What does this mean for blockchain in Nigeria?
Already, blockchain and crypto companies have enough problems proving their legitimacy to regulators save for the recent progress made in the form of a blockchain policy and the licencing of two crypto exchanges by the Security and Exchange Commission.
This disruption in one of the entities that is supposed to be fostering acceptance and adoption of blockchain in Nigeria could skew the perception of the government and the public on blockchain.
Chuta, however, sees things differently.
“Our industry is bigger than SiBAN by far. It will continue to make progress.” Without SiBAN, he’s confident engagement with regulators will continue and industry players have nothing to worry about.
Chuta who who is currently leading the blockchain policy steering committee said that the creation of the blockchain policy shows the government now understands the importance of blockchain technology.
The next step for the government now is to grow blockchain talents and allow more use cases such as real estate tokenisation and storing important information.
Although he said there’s been some slowness to the full implementation of the policy, — which is normal in the public sector — what the steering committee is doubling down on is creating awareness.
One way it is doing this is with the Centralised Intelligence Conference, which held on the 10th and 11th of October 2024.
As the committee continues to improve blockchain adoption, the faith of one of the most recognised blockchain associations hangs in the balance, and in les than a week, SiBAN might longer be recognised by the government.
