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Nigerians Are Not Transparent At Ports – Customs Comptroller Laments

Mr Willy Egbudin, the Comptroller of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Apapa Command, says lack of transparency is the bane of effective cargo clearance at Nigerian ports.
Egbudin told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Lagos that too many discrepancies in documents the public presented for cargo clearance were affecting the smooth operations of the service.
“The problem we are facing with the trading public is not (being) compliant enough; we still have discrepancies in their declarations.
“Most of them are not transparent; they are not honest when they are making declarations.
“When you make honest declaration, you make things easier for the Nigeria Customs Service and you are also making things easier for yourself.
“Because your trade will be facilitated, that means you can now clear your goods within a very short time.
“By the time you make dishonest declaration and the Nigerian customs discovers it, you end up paying demurrage and the demurrage sometimes might be more than the DN (Debit Note) that you are going to pay.
“So, if you declare transparently, you are going to achieve that 48-hour which government has always talked about.
“Is that 48-hour clearance of goods from the ports is achievable but it is just for the trading public, for them to do the needful.
He said that in spite of all the challenges facing the command, it surpassed the revenue generated in January 2015, compared to the corresponding period of 2016. Egbudin said that the command generated N23.4 billion in January 2016, up from N20.7 billion generated in January 2015.
He urged importers not to engage in unwholesome goods, adding that bringing in such goods would lead to prosecution and seizures. “In spite of the fact that the volume of trade is low but we also look inwards especially in terms of intervening by issue of DN, intervention by issuing Debit Note.
“We issue them DN, to get those collections which they have not paid, so, we look inwards to ensure that nobody goes with the government money.
“For now, import seizures we have only had one. In exports, we have had about two.
“In fact, three now, because there is just one, which we have not actually finalised but definitely is going to be seized.
“Roughly sawn woods, timber, they are prohibited. “If you want to export timber, it has to be processed and cut to size. That is the only way we can export timber; those are the seizures we have made so far.’’
Egbudin, however, urged both importers and exporters to make honest declarations so as to enable the Comptroller-General of Customs, retired Col. Hameed Ali to achieve the N1trillion revenue target Thanks for reading.

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