Shareholders at the 43rd Annual General Meeting of the University Press Plc. have lauded the publishing company on its drive and commitment to payment of dividends in spite of the biting economic situation occasioned by the COVID-19 pandemic.
UPPlc., on Thursday, at the Conference Room of its Three Crowns Building, Jericho, Ibadan, declared 5kobo dividend per share for the 2020/2021 financial year that ended on March 31, 2021.
The business of the day included laying of the Audited Financial Statements for the year ended and the Report of the Directors, External Auditors and Audit Committee thereon before the members, as well as declaration of dividend; re-election of Non-Executive Directors; and the ratification of the appointment of two newly appointed Independent Non-Executive Directors, HRM Josephine A. Diete-Spiff; and Joseph Daudu, (SAN).
One of the shareholders at the meeting, Mrs Bisi Bakare, commended the board on its efforts at issuing dividends despite the challenges.
Stating that the company needed to device better means of guaranteeing profitability, Bakarenoted that “The year under review was a very challenging one throughout the world due to shut down of schools. Noteworthy is the fact that COVID-19 pandemic brought the importance of technology to our attention. How are we positioning ourselves for the remote/online learning, and what are we doing to ensure affordability of our books?”
Anthony Omojola, another shareholder and proxy on the occasion, said that the reality of the moment took a toll on businesses and the entire global community.
“We encourage the management (of UPPlc.) to look at better ways of generating revenues. There is room for improvement. The registrar should be able to send sms to all shareholders coded in our register to address the issue of unclaimed dividends. The exchange rate would continue to glide; we should do more to earn more money so that we can service our needs,” Omojola said.
Mr Eric Akinduro, stated that the company’s gesture indicated that the interest of shareholders was well situated.
He said, “University Press Plc. is not immune from what is happening all over the world. We still need to commend the efforts of the board, management and staff. The five kobo we are getting though is too small, it is coming out of the passion and the commitment of the board, management and staff, because the result is not too good.
“We want them to look at ways of making it more dynamic so that next time, we can have a better result to talk about. One of the things that affected the company is government change of curriculum, leading to more obsolete inventory and then, our attitude towards book reading in Africa is not too good.”
Meanwhile, the Chairman, Board of Directors, UPPlc., Obafunso Ogunkeye, has expressed optimism to the company’s shareholders that there would be an improvement in profitability and dividend sharing in the current financial year.
Ogunkeye, who described the year under review as ‘challenging,’ said, “The question of increase in profitability hinges on so many factors which are not within our control such as insecurity, depreciation of the value of naira, inflation and the pandemic.
“We are hopeful that we will do better than last year. Necessarily, payment of dividend or the amount to be paid to shareholders would improve over what we have in the 2020/2021 financial year.”
He stated that the company, in the last 15 to 20 years, had an unbroken history of payment of dividend immediately after its annual general meetings and continued to keep faith with the commitment in spite of the pandemic.
He noted, “These challenges are overwhelming and we sympathise with the government. This is because some of the challenges are not out of the doings of the government, whether by commission or omission, it is not what is within the control of government.
“As regards government’s economic policies, we sympathise with the government and we are only working within the constraints of what we have. Insecurity is a big issue and if that were to be curtailed, we are sure that the business environment will improve substantially.”
On his part, Mr Samuel Kolawole, Managing Director, UPPlc., urged the Federal Government to be committed to creating enabling environment for businesses to thrive.
Kolawole, who described Forex instability as a huge challenge to doing business, said that “Infrastructure deficit is still there; whatever the government is doing, they should do a lot more to make the business environment conducive.
“The issue of multiple taxations and uncertainties surrounding taxation have to be resolved so that those in businesses can concentrate on what they know how to do best. We don’t need to carry all these burdens on us.”
Accordingly, Kolawole said the company would leverage technology and explore other competitive edges for productivity, stating that “Our financial year starts in April, and if you look at our performance so far this year, you will see that we have recovered from the challenges of pandemic and we are doing better than we did last year.
“So, we have continued to improve and we hope we get better. We are not going to get there in one day as it is not an easy task to bounce back from the challenges of 2020, as schools were the first to be closed when the pandemic hit the country. It affected our customer base, but we are recovering from it.
“In this current year, we are doing more than we did last year. On technology, we are doing our research on e-books and e-learning and very soon, you would begin to see the dividends. Last year, we also produced revision videos.
“One of the major problems is high cost of input. We print most of our books overseas. Even if we print in Nigeria, we would still have to import printing materials. All of us know what is happening with Forex.”
Reacting to questions on trade receivables, the Executive Director, Finance, GA Adebayo, said, “There was a reduction in sales. The academic calendars varied from state to state, that affected sales but that is not a threat to the company. On the trade payable, we have challenges in the Forex market. At some point, we wanted to pay many of our foreign printers but the Forex was not available and that was beyond our control.
“We have so much innovations but the purchasing power of consumers who are buying the books affected sales.”
Also present at the meeting are the Executive Director, Publishing, Mrs Folakemi Bademosi; Company Secretary/Legal Adviser, Mrs Binitie Aboyade-Cole; a non-executive director, Prof. Akachi Ezeigbo.
Other non executive directors, Ayodeji Olorunda, Yomi Adewusi, and Olayinka Lawal, alongside others shareholders joined the meeting, which was streamed live on the company’s website: www.universitypressplc.com.
