The Shippers’ Association, Lagos State (SALS) has advocated for the audit of all the government agencies operating at the nation’s seaport since they are running business.
However, SALS exempted the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) from the proposed auditing on the ground that the agency is not a revenue generating agency like their counterparts in the industry but depend on government subvention for its survival.
The President of the association, Rev. Jonathan Nicol who made this call in an exclusive interview with Primetime Reporters in Lagos recently contended that the NSC as the Economic Regulator of the ports needed to be heavily funded by government adding that it was not meant to go out there and begin to devise a means for it to begin to generate funds for government even as he said that Economic Regulator all over the world were funded by the government.
Nicol said,” We recommend that all government agencies should be audited because they are running business even though they don’t pay taxes but that is business, they even make money more than the businessmen. The only exception from this auditing the way I know is the Nigerian Shippers’ Council because they are not a revenue generating agency. They depends on government for subventions, so if they overspend, they are on their own. Again, they do take money from the coffers of the government, it is wise for you to discharge whatever you have taken, that is for the Nigerian Shippers’ Council.
“When you talk about agencies that make money, they bill the shippers, they will pay and you issue receipt, money comes to them and money is meant for government and government says it is broke, they need to be audited because they are receivi9ng money from the public and we have their receipt. So, you cannot just eat your cake and have it back”.
He pointed out that the Standards Organization of Nigeria (SON) was one of the richest organization in the country saying that shippers pay twice for one transaction as far as SON was concerned.
“You pay in hard currency and you pay their stamping fee which is even more expensive than the first and they have all the SONCAP Certificates in the system, they will not remind you that you have to come for stamp duty, suddenly you see them on top of the bridge like bandits arresting containers. I don’t think they were given that law to do that because we believe that Standards Organization of Nigeria was set up to make sure that products measure up to the Nigerian and international standards. What are they doing in the ports?
“So, all of them that receives money from the public is accountable to give us the account of what they did with all the money they collected not the Shippers’ Council”, he said.
Recall that the Minister of Transportation, Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, at a forum in Lagos recently had announced government’s intention to audit all the government agencies operating in the maritime sector with the intent of determining the strength and weakness of each agency so as to reposition them to function better.
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