Caption: A cross section of some seized exotic vehicles at Federal Operations Unit (FOU) Zone A of the Nigeria Customs Service.
A frontline freight forwarder, Mr. George Okafor last week raised alarming saying that the terminals in Lagos are filled to the brim with imported vehicles that are yet to be cleared from the ports.
Okafor who said this in a chat with Shipping Position Daily at the Ports & Terminal Multipurpose Limited at Tin Can Island however blamed alleged inefficiency of the banks during the COVID-19 lockdown as the reason for the backlog of un-cleared vehicles at the ports.
“Because banks have not been working due to the lockdown, there is no money to clear vehicles at the ports, so the terminals are filled up with vehicles”.
According to him, “importation did not improve. It is supposed to go down but because of all these problems, clearing of vehicles reduced because some people have money, but they cannot pay duty because they cannot raise cash because the banks are not working, that is one of the problems we are facing you see almost all the terminals are filled up”.
The PTML chapter chairman of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF) also lamented low importation of vehicles into the country, even as he charged the government to find a way to adjust to the reality which the COVID-19 pandemic has caused.
“What I know is that the government should look for a way to think out of box, the COVID-19 has come to stay, just like HIV; so we should look for a way to deal with it. When HIV/AIDS came, it was like a death sentence; the disease is real so let the government not put fear in the citizens” he said.
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