There is no sign that the five-week breakdown in the online operations of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) would be restored soon, TheNiche has learnt.
The CAC had reported a total disruption of its registration services since August 15, according to a statement issued by its Public Affairs Director, Churchill Williams.
He said the disruption is a deliberate attempt to sabotage efforts to deploy a new online registration system beginning from October 1.
The CAC had said it was taking all steps to reconfigure its server and restore normal services latest by August 25. But investigation showed that the engineers working to fix it have met a dead end.
There was only a partial restoration of the server on Tuesday, September 16.
The CAC said it suspected sabotage, which may be connected with the change of its information communication technology (ICT) managers.
A source knowledgeable about the workings of the organisation said: “CAC claimed it was an internal sabotage. But what we have found out is that there was a company that was managing its ICT structures.
“It was a contract that runs into hundreds of millions of naira. Since the current head of the CAC came last year, he has been looking for opportunity to terminate the contract without paying them off.
“So, the people had to put in a code that damaged the systems.”
The breakdown has led to the disappearance of vital records in the server, making it impossible to search for them online.
Banks are also having difficulty in authenticating information about companies prospecting for loans or seeking to do business with them. Such information as company’s address and directors are some of the basic information banks regularly require at the CAC while dealing with clients.
The registration of the names of companies has also been paralysed.
“To confirm whether a name is available would now require doing the search with physical files. In the online search, it would not have taken more than a day. Now, you have to go to Abuja and do a physical search of that file,” a source in the CAC confirmed.