After the launch of the platform on June 2, the Digital Investment Window (GNI) was officially presented on June 5 by the Director General of the National Agency for the Promotion of Investments in Gabon. Developed with the assistance of a national operator, the GNI provides advantages in terms of time and costs related to business creation procedures. Thanks to this tool, Gabon hopes to gain points in the next Doing business ranking.
The Coronavirus has forced the National Agency for the Promotion of Investments in Gabon (ANPI-Gabon) to accelerate its digitalization process. To dematerialize all the procedures for setting up, managing the life of a business and paying administrative fees for a business, it offers its users a new product: the Digital Investment Counter (GNI).
Launched on June 2 and officially presented on June 5 by the Director-General of ANPI-Gabon, the GNI allows economic operators to create, modify or close their businesses online. Like the physical investment window, the GNI concentrates a set of administrations: Taxes, Court, Registry, CNSS, Ogapi, Official Journal, etc. “In our digitalization strategy, we wanted to digitize this procedure,” said Gabriel Ntougou. “Today, for example, to create a business, you just have to go to the ANPI site created for that. www.gni-anpigabon.com, you enter your data to create your business, ”he added.
According to Gabriel Ntougou, the GNI generates a reduction of the delays in terms of formalization for obtaining a circuit sheet. The same is true for the waiting time and the costs of the procedures with the establishment of Covid prices, applicable to all investors regardless of nationality. Which is not the case with the physical counter. “You can create your own business at 15,000 CFA francs and a company at 50,000 CFA francs. GNI provides these benefits, ”he said. The platform incorporates a geolocation system allowing companies to be located if necessary. With on one side the economic operator who completes the formalities and on the other side of the back office the administrations which validate the data and documents, the signatures necessary for the validation of the company are done electronically, ditto for the different stamps.
If with the physical counter-economic operators were forced to make 8 copies of their statutes and to provide themselves with a stamp on each page, with the GNI it is a copy of the statutes with the payment of a digital stamp. For public limited companies (SA) which have their statutes drawn up by notaries, this involves scanning them in the software. The costs inherent in the entire procedure are payable via Airtel money, Mobi cash or bank card via United Bank for Africa (UBA). For Gabriel Ntougou, this digitalization improves public service.
From June 2 to 5, more than 800 people connected with the key, creating more than 150 accounts. However, usually, it takes at least 1 month to reach such figures. “We want to move to 100% online formalization in the very short term,” he hopes. “The site is magnificent because if you have difficulties you can send messages directly from the site and immediately an ANPI interlocutor responds to you regarding the need expressed” he declared, indicating that measures are also in place to support operators in difficulty, at the ANPI-Gabon level.
Doing business rank improvement
Ranked 169th in the 2019 edition of Doing business, with this dematerialization, ANPI-Gabon hopes that Gabon will gain points in the next ranking. This is all the more so because, among other things, it is linked to the ease of starting a business via an evaluation of the cost, time and number of procedures necessary for an investor.
On the purely administrative side, the project was developed with the ministry in charge of Investment Promotion. For the development of the tool, ANPI-Gabon was supported by the company Clikafrik group limited, a local authority. “The added value we have of having a local partner is that in order to be able to supervise the tool, we don’t have to wait for the partner to move. He is there and we can easily respond to any difficulties that may arise, ”said Gabriel Ntougou. “The advantage also is that by being a national, he knows the economic structure of the country and the needs of operators. So, it is very well placed to provide solutions in consultation with the ANPI in order to be able to produce a useful product that really serves the people, “he argued.
