Much as the Comptroller General of Customs, CG Bashir Adewale Adeniyi has done a lot in less than two years in office to reposition and advance the Service by introducing some novel platforms, policies and reforms, some stakeholders in the nation’s maritime industry have said that it is not yet uhuru as operational challenges still persist.
Stakeholders who bared their minds on customs operations in Nigeria under CG Adeniyi said that complaints were still there as according to them, there were still delays at all the ports occasioned by server downtime, alerts and other operational issues.
According to the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of PatFuze Investment Limited, Dr. Fred Ajuzie, it takes three to four days to exit a job at the ports due to system failure which ultimately translates to payment of rent and demurrage as a result of the delays.
Insisting that alerts were still there, Ajuzie said, “You cannot capture a job now, make payment, do examination and you are talking about releasing the container tomorrow. The B’Odogwu is not functioning. We agree that we are still at the pilot stage, even if you go to the PTML, has it been so rosy? They are still battling to get connectivity with the banks so that the banks can be able to upload it.
“The only thing that changed by my own investigation is that customs is making more revenue in terms of remittance to please the President who put them there. Adeniyi has tried his best, I agree but the only thing I found out is that Adeniyi is trying to raise the bar in terms of revenue collection.
“The officers are trying to see if they can please their master because they are regimental people. Sometimes, they stay up to 48 hours without doing anything. If you go to CPC now, they will tell you that there’s no network. They will start examination by 12 noon and close around 4pm. The handling officers will now write a report that the system is not working. By the time you come the next morning, they system has not started working. The officers have to wait until the system starts running.”
Asked if he was so sure customs commence examination by 12 noon, he said, “At what time does the terminal operators drop containers for examination? Even if they drop containers overnight for examination, at what time do they open their gate for examination? It’s by 12 noon, when they are supposed to open by 9am and examination of cargo ends at 4pm.”
On the attitude of Customs officers to the stakeholders, Ajuzie described it as zero saying, “This is because we are having new set of young officers running the affairs of customs and they have their mindset. If it were to be old officers who had known you as a person, it’s a different thing. But now, these ones already have what they think they can get out of what they are doing.
“I don’t want to dwell on whether the officers are corrupt or not. They are tax collectors, even in the bible, everybody knows the characteristics of tax collectors.”
Also speaking, the Publicity Secretary of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents, ANLCA, Chief Chima Idika agreed with Ajuzie that customs was more interested in getting revenue than facilitating trade as according to him, their people were still complaining about delays in cargo processing.
“You will do capturing, some times, it will take two days for the system to come up for you to capture your job. B’Odogwu now can only work effectively in one command, that is at PTML. The issue is that the complaints are still there and if we are talking about revenue generation, how much was dollar before this time? When we are saying that there is increase in revenue generation, it is still the same value”, he submitted.
Noting that Customs attitude towards import was not anything to go by, Idika said, “There are still delays in all the ports. The law is that if you exit your goods, you are free to go. But when you exit your goods, you still come to the exit gate, somebody will look at it, tag it, give it to another person, the person will check, tell you no, what you paid is not commensurate to what you have. They will now start rechecking and this alert thing is something I don’t understand.
“You will get a PAAR, quoting what you have, the PAAR will look at your documents and give you duty and when you come to customs, this PAAR was issued by customs, when we were in CRI, IDR and so on, customs will tell you that it is advisory because they were not the people issuing it. Now, they are the ones issuing PAAR and they are still telling you that it is advisory. So, why then did we change the Service providers handling it before?
“PAAR does not come physically to check what you have, PAAR works with your documents. I have been telling our people, put what you have in the container in your documentation and let us fight for “what I have is what I declared” and let us know where the customs will hold us.
“Nobody followed you to buy the goods, so, there should not be a standard. The shoes produced in Italy and the shoes produced in Aba are not of the same value and they cannot be classified as the same. The same applies to what is produced in China and what is produced in America. Even the cost of production is not the same. Pricing should be based on country of origin, not universal pricing.
“You can see some people bringing in goods and somebody will tell them this is undervalued. How do you know what is undervalued? Can you clinically tell what is undervalued? That is where we have problem. There should be a standard from different countries of origin. What I have is not what you have. Samsung phone is not the same price with Infinix or Techno phone. If you buy an iphone, it is not the same price with Infinix, so why would I tell you I am having an iPhone or I am having an Infinix, I give you my price, you don’t know where I produced it from, a lot of companies are there in China that produces anything.”
Reminded that Customs could easily obtain the cost of any item imported into the country online, he said, “Anybody can put anything online. I can develop a website now and say I have iPhone 18 and I am selling it for four million. We are having issues with customs over duplication of duties.”
Photo: Mr. Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, Comptroller General of Customs.
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