The Registrar, Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN), Sir Mike Jukwe has praised the resilience of the Nigerian freight forwarders saying that they had gone out of the ordinary to make Nigerian economy robust.
Jukwe who was speaking in a goodwill message at a one day Mandatory Continuing Professional Development Programme (MCDP) organized by the Nigerian Institute of Freight Forwarders and Customs Brokers in conjunction with CRFFN in Lagos on Friday noted that although the practitioners had no formal education in freight forwarding practice, they were able to weather the storms in carrying out their duty to the nation.
According to him,” I always say it time and time again that our practitioners have done something unprecedented. Before now, none of our practitioners had gone through any formal school to learn anything about freight forwarding and if you can keep this country, if you can deliver at the stage that we went even without any formal education, I am beginning to wonder what will happen to Nigeria when freight forwarders are well trained, where capacity is built for them to deliver as we found in other parts of the world”.
“We are truly intelligent; God has blessed us with that natural intelligence. Wherever you see black people particularly Nigerians operating alongside with the so-called experts, the whites, we beat them. If you go to school with them, you discover that Africans particularly we the Nigerians excel and that is why if a Nigerian wants to do something good, he does it very well and if he wants to do something bad, he does it worst”.
He thanked the participants for making out time to attend the training adding that they were writing their names in gold as well as making history as according to him, there would come a time when freight forwarders in Nigeria would leave the shores of this country to go and train people not just in Africa but to the developed world also.
The Registrar also expressed his happiness that the maritime journalists were part of the training as they report about freight forwarding even though they did not know quite a lot about the profession they were covering just like the freight forwarders themselves urging them to keep up the spirit.
“All the programmes we are having, we make sure that all the maritime desk people are party to it so that they will understand us better. As much as we are ignorant about this, they too are doing things out of their raw skills too. It is now they will understand the rudiments of what the freight forwarding is all about. So, we appreciate it, we encourage you, anytime there is an opportunity, come forward”, Jukwe said.
In an interview, the Chairman, National association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF) Lillypond/Ijora Chapter, Rev. Emmanuel Agubanze said he was highly elated to be part of the training adding that the freight forwarders needed to be trained and retrained for professionalism to be ushered into the clearing procedure in Nigeria.
“So, the training is a wonderful thing. It is a good thing from CRFFN and I am happy to be part of it”, he said.
Rev. Agubanze called on freight forwarders who are yet to key into this training to do so if they want to remain in business arguing that one cannot be talking about moving the industry forward without education.
“So, I am calling on everybody, people don’t know what they have until they lose it. So, today we have seen that we are going in the right direction and I want to use this medium to call on every freight forwarder to come forward and undergo the Mandatory Continuing Professional Development Programme. It is very important”, he said.
On his part, the National President, Association of Registered Freight Forwarders, Nigeria (AREFFN), Dr. Frank Ukor described the training as the best he had ever attended in his lifetime.
Dr. Ukor expressed his belief that many freight forwarders would like to attend the next training after this thereby recommending the training for every freight forwarder to attend saying that the knowledge one got from attending such training were enormous.
He said,” I am talking to you as a professional, if I put in practice what I have learned here, I am going to make a lot of difference and our maritime industry, the freight forwarding sector of the economy will be greatly improved, if we put into practice even if it is not all, half of what we have learnt here”.
The AREFFN boss posited that if CRFFN through the Nigerian Institute of Freight Forwarders and Customs Brokers (NIFFCB) continued in this direction, in two years time, the Nigerian maritime industry was going to witness the emergence of core professionals which would in turn impact positively on the industry.
