Since the appointment of Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, as the acting Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), by President Bola Tinubu, he has hit the ground running by keying into the renewed hope vision of the current administration. From visiting traditional rulers to strengthening Customs, host communities relationship and liberalising and enforcing trade facilitation as well as strict border security.

Due to these efforts put in place, Adeniyi’s appointment has continue to receive commendations and applause from stakeholders in the sector who believed the appointment was that of a round peg in a round hole. They argued that finally, the service has been returned to career Customs officers that understand the rudiment of the system, trade facilitation and also foster officers’ career growth.

Speaking on the appointment, the former Acting National President, Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), Dr. Kayode Farinto, said Adeniyi’s appointments was a round pegs in round holes which will make impact in the Nigerian maritime sub- sector.

Farinto said, “We in ANLCA are particularly glad that our yearnings for career Customs Officer to be appointed the CG of Customs has been achieved. Remember,  ANLCA was at the 9th National Assembly during the amendment of the Customs and Excise Management Act (CEMA) where  one of our prayers was that the law  should made it mandatory for a career Customs Officer to be appointed as the Comptroller General of Customs and it was adopted and signed into law. We are grateful is happening in our life time and we thank President Tinubu for this feat.”

However, the acting Comptroller General of Customs must ensure further reform of the service, enforce trade facilitation, automation of Customs processes, increase ease of doing business and re-opening of land borders to Importation and revisiting of the Customs modernisation project.

Enthronement of Trade Facilitation Rather Than Revenue Generation 

In as much as the country needs Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), to provide basic infrastructure and Customs is pivotal to revenue generation for the country. This zeal to generate revenue has made Customs give revenue target to their Area commands. However, in a bid to achieve the targets, the officers put everything in place including jettison trade facilitation. Jettisoning trade facilitation has made Nigeria ports rank low on Ease of Doing Business (EoDB), ranking. The poor ranking on EoDB is also responsible for diversion of cargoes to neighboring countries where they are being smuggled into the country through the nation’s Porous borders.

The former Statistician-General of the federation, Yemi Kale, faulted the incentivising the Nigeria Customs Service to become a revenue-generating agency rather than facilitating international trade. Kale said the Federal Government has created an incentive Customs to drive revenue rather than trade by giving the service a percentage of the total annual revenue generated.

According to him, the government needs to change the wrong incentive given to Customs by giving the Service an incentive to facilitate trade rather than revenue. “I do not believe in imposing taxes on businesses because when a government increases taxes beyond normal, the business in question would be forced to pass the additional cost on to the consumers. Rather than impose taxes on business, the government need to block revenue leakages,” Kale said.

Ending Duty Benchmarking Policy

The acting Customs CG must automate the revenue collection processes of the service and put an end to benchmarking. Under the benchmarking policy, every 20ft or 40ft container pays a uniform duty rate irrespective of the value as contained on the invoice.

Importers and customs agents argue that the prices of goods in the international markets depend on negotiations outside the advertised online price tags.

 Also speaking on the policy, the former President of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), Dr. Eugene Nweke, said the policy exposes the customs service as toeing the line of illegality and unprofessionalism for the sake of more revenue generation. 

Nweke argued that this was without considering the consequences on Nigerians since importers will introduce higher prices to recoup their investments. He argued that the policy throws to the wind professionalism and expectations of the valuation officers whose responsibility is to calculate duties based on the value of the goods before them. 

Nweke, while condemning the decision said it will trigger inflation and bring more harm to the ailing economy than good. He called on the CGC Adeniyi to save Nigerians from such hardship by halting the policy of benchmarking.

 The Managing Director, Procter and Gamble Nigeria, Mokutima Ajileye, said dealing with the Customs has been difficult. According to her, manufacturers have situations where they import a product under a certain HS-Code only for it to get to the point of clearing at the port and the Customs says that the HS-Code is wrong. “Then, the product will be held at the port while the importer tries to resolve the HS-Code issues but at the end of the day, the manufacturer will be forced to pay demurrage and rent to the shipping company and terminal operators,” she explained. She said that such development only ends up putting the manufacturing sector under a lot of pressure.

Re-opening Of Land Borders for Vehicle Import

The last customs administration of Col. Hameed Ali (rtd), banned vehicles – used and new- importation through the land borders and restricted importation only through the seaports. The directive led to increase in smuggling and regular faceoff between the officers of the service and smugglers. This regular faceoff led to several casualty on both sides. Anti-smuggling units and border Customs across the countries lose several officers and men while trying to enforce this directive. This is basically because the nation’s border is porous and cannot be efficiently manned without introduction of technology.

However, aside casualty, these led to revenue loss as duty and taxes supposed to be earned by government through Customs are lost to smugglers who came into the country through unapproved routes. It was gathered that smuggling is still thriving because enough vehicles are not being manufactured locally to complement the imported ones since the policy took effect so, until the vehicle manufacturing sector is active, vehicle smuggling will continue to be on the rise in the country.

A  Clearing Agent, Anthony Ikezie, said smuggled vehicles do not pass through those borders, they pass through unguarded borders.

He further disclosed that the introduction of 15 per cent National Automotive Council (NAC), levy would increase vehicle smuggling. “Talking about the increase in the smuggling of vehicles, I will say that the newly introduced 15 per cent National Automotive Council levy is the best way to encourage smuggling. Smuggling is just a regular occurrence. As we speak, smuggling has not stopped; it is a regular, daily activity. Smuggling are transited through unguarded entry points where we don’t have people manning,” he said.

Review of $3.2bn Customs Modernisation Project

The acting CG should review the Customs Modernisation Project to know whether the service truly needs to invest such huge amount of money on modernisation when the current modernisation has increased the service revenue. This is because most stakeholders who have kicked against the project, premised it on the fact that the Customs service is presently one of the most automated government agency in the Country.

Also, there is an argument that the Customs modernisation for 20 years will result in some persons with vested interest taking away government revenue under the Comprehensive Import Supervision Scheme (CISS) account

For instance, a group of some senior Customs Officers have argued that the service has a homegrown Nigeria Integrated Customs Information System (NICIS) that only requires upgrade to meet the demands of current reality.

These officers added that NCS is the most modernised customs administration in West and Central Africa handling the highest volume of trade relying on a blend of technology and human expertise. They, however, queried an intended loan facility for modernisation that will impoverish the country.

They claimed that using the existing modernisation template of the service, the NCS has been able to move from generating N800 billion in 2015 to collecting N2 trillion in 2022 without the controversial concession. The group said over 3,500 officers of the Nigeria Customs Service have been trained while 150 of them are presently undergoing technical training on various aspects of modernisation required for trade.