Brela in fresh move to curb dubious activities

Arusha. Brela is setting up a special national register to document the identified owners of all business operations in order to deal with issues of companies operating like smokescreens that conceal dubious activities

The Business Registrations and Licensing Agency (Brela) has convened a meeting with relevant authorities in Arusha to create a seamless network of official information portal to help keep the local firms as well as their international associates closely monitored to ensure they adhere to laws and regulations.

“While most companies are genuine, we cannot ignore the fact that a few firms could be operating behind a façade yet being busy with illegal rackets such as human trafficking, money laundering, narcotics or even smuggling,” said the head of companies department of Brela, Mr Isidori Mkindi.

Being a worldwide problem, Tanzania is simply complying with other international communities to address the issue of some scrupulous firms hoarding illegal dealings in the backrooms of their otherwise legal looking front offices.

“But this is also beneficial to registered companies, once their partners or potential investors want to deal with local firms they normally ask for information about them and once they find them clean, it gets easy to hatch business dealings with them,” Mr Mkindi explained.

And in order to accomplish the mission Brela is working with other state organs to ensure that all firms operate as per their officially listed mandates.

The legal officer from the state attorney’s chamber, Mr Eliaimenyi Njiro, said the Brela workshop on beneficiary ownership is an important platform where all state organs get to learn how to deal with any situation related to firms that go against their registered activities.

“The State Attorney office is responsible for conducting investigations whenever such situations arise, it is thus important for us to learn more about company registrations, trademarks, partnership their tax returns and if they have international links,” she explained.

One her part, Ms Beatrice Gideon from the Regional Immigration Office who was also present, said her office relies on information from Brela when processing residential or working permits of foreigners coming to work or do business in Tanzania thus having a national register with all relevant information comes in handy.

It also came up during the workshop that some who are always seen at the forefront in a number of business operations their names hardly appear in the firms’ memorandums of association which means they could either be stooges or used faked identities to register their companies.

The authorities who attended the Brela workshop include Police Officers, representatives from the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA), the State Attorney Office and personnel from the Prevention and Combating Corruption Bureau.

Brela will next meet with practising lawyers through the Tanganyika Law Society (TLS) Arusha Chapter, and business owners through their Tanzania Chamber of Commerce and Industries.