CRFFN Has No Reason Not To Meet Her Financial Obligations, Says Former ANLCA Scribe, Mukaila

…Calls for finances of the Council to be investigated 

Following the reported inability of the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria, CRFFN, to pay its staff salaries, the immediate past National Secretary of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents, ANLCA, Alhaji Abdulazeez Babatunde Mukaila has said that the Council has no reason not to meet her financial obligations including salary payment for her staff.

Mukaila who made his position known in an interview with Primetime Reporters in his office in Lagos said that the development could only be possible if those he called “opportunistic people” were feeding fat from the purse of CRFFN, which he said was clear for everyone to see.

“As we speak, I just paid over N30,000 to CRFFN now as POF and that’s how every other businesses are paying. So, what are they doing with the money? Why won’t they be able to pay their staff? How many staff do they have? What’s the problem they are having?

“I do know that much of the allocation that they were getting is no more coming since the advent of the current administration and I wouldn’t want to believe that they could not pick their bills. I think that should be thoroughly investigated because they are making money daily. No container steps out of the port without paying POF”, he said.

Reminded of the claims by the management of CRFFN that some terminal operators were no longer cooperating with them in collecting the POF as they should leading to revenue leakage, he said, “I don’t want to believe those satellite terminals have volume more than the Apapa port. Don’t forget, in the last six months,  Apapa Customs Command made over N1 trillion, that translates to what should have gone to CRFFN. 

“If they don’t have the mechanisms to do that, come to think of it, what are they giving to the satellite terminals as an incentive for them to say go and pay CRFFN, you are not leaving this place? They just wanted the money, what are they giving back in return? 

“CRFFN is supposed to regulate the freight forwarders, they are supposed to get our back, they are supposed to do anything possible to make me, a professional freight forwarder have easy say at the port but what have they done? Where are they? When customs become very cantankerous, where are they? When some elements within the service want to just frustrate the process, what has CRFFN done? When the bonded terminals decided to wake up from the wrong side of their beds and slammed people with unnecessary bills, what have they done? What have they done to secure the port to enable the real freight forwarders have access? Nothing!

“When the shipping companies decided to change every format of protocol, and collect money for no service rendered, what have they done? They did nothing! So, they are not giving anything to anybody. So, if their revenue is dwindling, so be it. You must give to take. I am not surprised but it is very unfortunate that CRFFN which could have been a fall back position for freight forwarders were busy doing unnecessary things, now they are in distress.”

On why the visits to the accredited freight forwarding associations by the management of the Council earlier in the year did not yield expected return, Mukaila who is the Chief Executive Officer, CEO of Mickey Excellency Nigeria Limited stated, “There are fundamental issues. When the POF collection started, there was an agreement that says when a freight forwarder pays POF, he gets back some percentage. The question was placed before the Acting Registrar, where’s the money? And she couldn’t provide a convincing response. You registered people through a protocol and imputation to the system with full data and now, you can’t find them to return the agreed percent?

“There are too many things wrong with CRFFN and just as I said earlier, nobody is coming to help us as freight forwarders that they are supposed to regulate until we are ready to help ourselves and that too is coming soon.

“We will take charge of what we need to do as a professional body and let the CRFFN to know what they can do and what they cannot do. I have given you all the analysis of  what they ought to be doing to be visible which they are not doing. If I am going on the road and a customs officer becomes cantankerous, who do I report to? Because it is very clear you can’t go back to customs to report that.”

He however, blamed the woes of CRFFN on lack of ideas and innovation on the part of those running the Council saying, “if you don’t put a round peg in a round hole, this is what you get.”

He continued, “There is something called the minimal in our profession. Today, you see all these bikes flying around, what are they doing? It’s logistics!  How many of them do CRFFN know, they are under their purview. Just last week, the Post Master General called for a meeting. I sent a staff to represent me. There is Okada everywhere, they are logistics companies, they are regulated under CRFFN and Post Master General is the one issuing licenses.

“They lack ideas, they don’t see above their nose and they are saying they don’t have money.  Go to NAHCO and see exports done anyhow, people are just exporting palm oil, biscuits and so on there, yet, where is CRFFN? Go to Mile 2 and see what is happening, trailers that look like building, loading so high, where is CRFFN? You just come to the port. It’s a huge market but you need people who have the ideas to drive it.”

The ANLCA former National Secretary, thereafter, submitted that the only way for was for a freight forwarder or a technocrat in the maritime sector who has a hands on knowledge about the industry to be appointed a substantive Registrar of CRFFN to drive the Council.

“We have a lacuna now. So, at the appropriate time, let CRFFN see a situation where they can no longer pay staff salary as a test case. They need to look inwards and put on their thinking cap. They need to take up the challenge that was thrown at them”, he submitted.

Photo: Alhaji Abdulazeez Babatunde Mukaila, former National Secretary, ANLCA.

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