The atmosphere was that of praises and commendation at the Rockview Hotels Apapa, Lagos venue of the 3rd Year Anniversary of the Ports Gist and Events on MITV organized by Dr. Kayode Collins Farinto as the stakeholders in the Maritime industry gathered to assess the performance of the Pre-Arrival Assessment Report (PAAR) of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS).
Going by the level of complaints and condemnations in some cases that greeted the introduction of PAAR especially in the first three months of its operation, one would have thought that the same would have been the case at the event as the stakeholders drawn from both the Public and the Private Sector including the Service itself were in attendance for the make or mar event.
As expected, Dr. Farinto threw the first stone at the regime since he was the Chief Host for the event as he started by recounting how he initially doubted the workability of the regime especially when he was not sure of the preparedness of the men of the Nigeria Customs Service to handle the process.
He continued by saying that by the time he noticed the initial teething problems surround the PAAR, he started celebrating the fact that after all he had been vindicated.
But that celebration was not to last for so long as according to him,” but to my greatest surprise, I did a kind of research and investigation on the Pre-Arrival Assessment Repot and I noticed that the Nigeria Customs Service Management team has spent one-tenth of what the various Inspection Agents had collected from the Federal Government after eight years for issuing RAR”.
“You need to know that over two billion Naira if not over Five billion Naira had been spent to issue RAR, but less than one billion Naira has been spent on PAAR. The point here now is that PAAR is our document, PAAR is a home grown document. Do we still need to allow the foreigners to take one percent of our FOB to their foreign countries knowing full well that if Nigeria Customs Succeeds in the issuance of PAAR, there is every tendency that there will be more employment , the Estacodes that were being taken out will be ploughed back to our economy, the economy that is going comatose will definitely come up”.
He informed that when the issue of whether or not PAAR can be queried came up, he agreed with the Service that PAAR could be queried on quantity but not on value.
“However, querying of PAAR should be done in a modern and better way. It shouldn’t be used to extort our members because the service is trying serving us to make sure that the Nigeria Customs Service of yester years is not what we have now”.
“What am I saying? What I am saying is that PAAR cannot be queried on value, I keep saying it because before PAAR is issued, the Valuation Unit of the Nigeria Customs Service is involved. But when somebody has a PAAR and said that he is bringing in microphones of five hundred pieces, after examination, five thousand was discovered; you will agree with me that that kind of PAAR can be queried. There is discrepancies in the quantity, already by virtue of CEMA, the consignment is supposed to be seized “, he said.
He commended the Comptroller-General of Customs, Alhaji Dr. Dikko Inde Abdullahi for remaining undaunting in his drive to facilitate trade through the instrumentality of PAAR .adding that,” there is no gainsaying however that the Pre-Arrival Assessment Report has stabilized hence the need for its appraisal in the last ten months.
But in a move that seemed to contradict what Dr. Farinto had said, the National President, Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), Prince Olayiwola Shittu maintained that from inception, there was never a time he had entertained doubt in his mind that PAAR would work.
He stated that having undergone different import clearing regimes in the nation’s maritime industry, PAAR has been regarded as the best system not only by the World Bank, but also by World Customs Organization and World Customs Brokers Organization for emulation by other countries.
Hear him,” after listening to my very good young brother Dr. Farinto on how he was able to make a U-turn over the issue of PAAR, I felt vindicated because from the word go, I have always had the believe that PAAR will work and it must work”.
“Over the years, having gone through a lot of experimentation starting from CRI and ending up in RAR, I knew we were walking into the pockets of these appointees to cart away our inheritance in order for them to punish us”.
“PAAR has been regarded as the best system not only by the World Bank but by World Customs Organization and World Customs Brokers Organization for the emulation of other countries. We were told some countries are already coming to Nigeria to learn.
He attributed the teething problems encountered at the onset of PAAR to inability of Nigerians to accommodate change even as he accused the former operators of the Risk Assessment Report (RAR) as sabotaging the efforts of the Nigeria Customs Service at ensuring that PAAR worked.
This he said they did by hiding away some of the information that they were supposed to leave at the disposal of the Service on the eve of their departure so as to see whether the Service would fail so that they come back and continue with their business as according to him, nobody wants to lose a juicy income.
The ANLCA boss however saluted the resilience of the Management of the Nigeria Customs Service who believed that it could start from nowhere like other countries did and in starting from nowhere fashioned out the Nigerian home grown system of customs operations.
On whether or not PAAR can be queried, he said,” this is where I want to disagree again with Dr. Farinto when he said yes, PAAR can be queried on quantity but PAAR cannot be queried on value. PAAR can be queried on anything at because PAAR system is there for your declaration”.
Those in the ruling Centre don’t know what you imported, you the Customs Broker don’t even know what was imported by your principal. But he gave you the documents for you to please do this declaration for me so that they can rule on it”.
Giving a statistical analysis of PAAR in its ten months lifespan in a lecture entitled,” X-raying and analyzing the effectiveness of PAAR as a Modern tool for trade facilitation-Understanding PAAR performance and Implementation challenges”, the National President, National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), Dr. Eugene Nweke put the total figure of PAARs y the uploaded through the banks at 58,310, uploaded final documents approved at 51,464 while the total number of PAAR generated was 43,252 between December 2013 to March2014.
Going a step further, Dr. Nweke put the total cost of running the RAR by the former Destination Inspection Agents, WEBB Fontaine inclusive in a period of eight years (2006-2013) at #411,840,000,000 (four hundred and eleven billion, eight hundred and forty million Naira) while that of the Nigeria Customs Service in running PAAR was put at #652,458,888.32 (Six hundred and fifty-two million, four hundred and fifty-eight thousand, eight hundred and eighty-eight Naira, thirty-two kobo).
“I make bold to state that PAAR remains a capable modern trade facilitation tool compliant to international best practices hereby requiring that some of the issues raised above be addressed squarely”.
“The provision of at least two weeks to conclude all documentation processes before vessel arrival is unbeatable if diligent efforts and honesty is applied in all facets of international transactions and clearance processes within the Customs ports. This is the sure way to true attainment to 48 hours cargo clearance out of the port as canvassed by the Federal Government”, Nweke said.
Also speaking, the Area Project Manager of the Nigeria Customs Service, Apapa Area Command, Deputy Comptroller Yusuf Malanta Ibrahim said that the Nigeria Customs Service had saved the Country of #36.7 billion representing one percent Comprehensive Import Supervision Scheme (CISS) charges on imports that were initially paid to service providers since it took over the Destination Inspection Scheme in December last year.
Malanta said that since the introduction of the Pre-Arrival Assessment Report (PAAR), the NCS hds been fine tuning the process of its issuance to ensure that trade is facilitated.
Part of the effort he said was the working round the clock in three shifts of officers at the PAAR ruling center in Abuja which had led to an average of 1,000 to 1,200 PAAR’s being generated daily.
He explained that with PAAR, the importers knew in advance and could predict the duties and taxes payable on their consignments even before examination.
“During the era of the service providers, it was very difficult for an importer after submitting his document to know when the documents will be out. You cannot also determine the duty or amount you are going to pay and what time you will exit your cargo at the port but with PAAR all of that has been eliminated”.
“If you are honest in your declaration and submission to your bank, sincerely speaking before you get back to the office from where you are coming from, you will definitely get an alert on your mobile handset or e-mail address that your PAAR has been accepted or rejected unlike before when you don’t have contact with your bank and the service providers can’t talk to them”.
“You will be stuck between the bank and the service providers and the bank will not accept talking with you, so you see the beauty of PAAR platform,” he said.
He added that the command generated N713.6 billion between January and September 2014 as against N606.7 billion it generated in 2013 before it took over the destination inspection scheme.
From the fore-going, one may be tempted to say that there is an overwhelming consensus that the Nigeria customs Service may be getting it right after all. It was said that by the time the Service completed the full integration process, there will be little or nothing to complain any more.
But how soon will that be? Only time will tell!!!
