There are indications that the destination inspection service providers who were sent out of Nigerian ports in 2013 are now making moves to return to the port to perform the same functions.
This indication was dropped last week by the National President of Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) Prince Olayiwola Shittu at a forum in Lagos.
Shittu said his association recently uncovered underground plans by the Nigerian Senate to bring back the service providers. According to him, there is an ongoing battle at the highest level of government, between the Federal Ministry of Finance which regulates activities of Nigeria Customs Service, and the Senate as to who should purchase scanning machines at the port.
Shipping Position Daily investigations revealed that the over $120 million scanning machines that were bequeathed to the Nigeria Customs Service by service providers in 2013 have since stopped functioning.
This has compelled the Nigeria Customs to resort to physical examination of all containers, the process, which many described as ‘‘cumbersome and time wasting.
Apart from this, the absence of the scanners has also led to increase in importation of arms, ammunitions and other dangerous cargoes into Nigeria.
Speaking at the meeting last week, the ANLCA president said that political power play was the main reason Nigerian ports do not have functional scanners.
"To let you know why there are no scanners at the ports for now, the Nigeria Customs Service has made a case to purchase the scanners, since they are the ones that will be using it and maintain it, recall that it was the same customs that was using the former scanners but with one service provider doing the maintenance"
"The service providers that were asked to leave the port have parleyed with the Senate to see if they would be asked to go and buy the scanners, to operate it and give the interpretation to customs. But the customs refused because the scanner is a security operation"
"The ministry of finance has now come with its own, insisting that since they supervise the customs, it is the ministry that would buy the scanners and give it to customs"
"That argument is there at the topmost level and this is why there are no scanners at the ports, it is political" Shittu alleged.
He also said that this was why the finance ministry surreptitiously introduced the Palletization policy. He argued that this is not an alternative to having scanning machines.
The scanning machines at the ports were inherited from Cotecna Destination Inspection limited, Global Scan Systems and SGS scanning Nigeria Ltd, which carried out destination inspection operations at the gateways, on contract basis for about eight years, before the service was transferred to the Nigeria Customs Service.
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