Am 9.2.2011 schrieb "Abbas Mahmoud" <abbasjnr@hotmail.com>:>>Society
- The registration process is tedious, slow and requires alot of pushing. When we register
as a society, WMKE will be an amorphous institution, meaning it can't be sued on
it's own. Rather, it is the officials or trustees that can be sued. Property/assets
are registered under the trustees. The Society should file annual returns (e.g. indicating
any change in trustees).>Manuel: What are the costs of this option?I never bothered to
ask the lawyer. Due to a Society's drawbacks, I instantly ruled it out as an option.
But I'll find out how much it costs and get back to you, nonetheless.>>Tax
ExemptionAfter getting the Certificate of registration, we should contact the Minister for
Finance and apply for tax exemption. The by-laws should clearly indicate that we are a
non-profit organisation. A petition letter should be written to the Minister when applying
for tax exemption with supporting documents (from WMF and/or ICT Board and/or Google
Kenya). Tax exemption requires political pushing/influence -- so the duration of us
getting tax exemption could be as short as a week and as long as decades!>Manuel: Does
this apply for Trust or Society or both?It applies to both.>>Bylaws:The lawyer has
proposed some changes to the bylaws:-That we have a two-tier board structure: The Board Of
Trustees & The Executive Committee. The EC could be in charge of funding/project
proposals etc while the Board oversees and has the final say in whatever the EC might
suggest. We could have 2 board members in the EC as well.>Manuel: hmm, I don't
understand why making it so complicated. I haven't heardof one chapter that has this
kind of construction. In contrast, normallyyou have the problem of not being able to find
enough members tocandidate. This will be even worse if you have two committees>I think
that all this is not an issue of WMKE and even if it becomes anissue in the future it will
take some years - then you can still changethe bylaws accordingly - if your members really
want that. WMDE forinstance has still trouble finding enough members for their board
ofeight.>For now, with much less ressources, keep it stupid and simple. Try toavoid
overhead where possible.I agree that something simple and stupid is better.
Lodewijk, Delphine and all,Thanks so much for your comments. I expected some of the local
WMKE participants to give their feedback as well...Anyway, since we were colonized by
Britain, I gave the lawyer WMUK bylaws so that he could check out how WMUK registered. He
found out that WMUK was a limited liability company by guarantee, and told me that
he'll assess our chapter and explore the possibility of us registering as a limited
liability company.
Anyway, I don't have all the info with me right now, so to cut the long story short, I
think we should arrange a meetup with the lawyer so that we can discuss and decide which
mode of registration suits us best, whether or not to make the changes that the lawyer
proposed in the bylaws, and any other related matters.And BTW, I promised that I'd
have posted the revised bylaws but that's not possible at the moment since apparently
we have to decide on whether we want a Society, Trust or a Limited Liability Company so
that the lawyer can redact the current bylaws to suit the mode of registration we'd
decide on. So I expect that the final bylaws will be published after we meet and agree on
the above-mentioned issues.I suggest that we meet on Saturday 26 Feb 2011 (at iHub?).
--Abbas.
--------------------------------------
Feel free to contact me:
Abbas Mahmood
Tel: +254722215101
Facebook: abbasjnr(a)hotmail.com
Skype: abbasjnr
Wikimedia Kenya Member
"Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to
the sum of all human knowledge. That's our commitment."
Please donate:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate/Now/en