The Lagos Shippers Association has said that it is ready for a show down with the management of the Apapa and Tin Can Island commands of the Nigeria Custom Service for the alleged ill-treatment being meted out to its members, especially in the issuance of value on cargoes.
The Lagos Shippers Association has said that it is ready for a show down with the management of the Apapa and Tin Can Island commands of the Nigeria Custom Service for the alleged ill-treatment being meted out to its members, especially in the issuance of value on cargoes.
First Vice President of the association, Reverend Phillip Urubisi in a chat with Shipping Position Daily in Lagos last week explained that the group has decided to first approach the Customs Area Controller of both Apapa and Tin Can Customs on the development, before taking it to the Comptroller General of the service.
Urubisi who was speaking after the monthly meeting of the association in Apapa also lambasted the Shippers Complaint Unit of the Nigeria Shippers’ Council for not representing the interest of the shippers accordingly.
Narrating the ordeal of his members, he said, “we have discovered now for about two weeks that the way customs is treating shippers is not the way it should be, a shipper will go to the port to take his consignment, on the point of taking the consignment, they will place it on alert”.
“Getting to the long room, they will tell you that the value of your goods is low, we are not disputing this, they have the mandatory power to do that, but what we are saying is that they should tell us on what basis they are working”.
“Customs have a way of finding out these things, it is either you check from the internet if the cost is what the shipper claims it is at the point of import, the most annoying thing is that they can raise a debit note of N2million, at the end they begin to haggle as if they are selling crayfish and then come down to some amount, after this they will still want you to give them something from it, it is disheartening”, he claimed.
He also lamented the current situation at Apapa port where the scanners are working at an epileptic pace.
According to him, the shippers are currently being forced to bear the burden of the inability of the concessionaires.
He claimed that members of the association are being made to pay huge demurrage on the trapped containers at the port.
Urubisi alleged that the Shippers’ Council has not represented the shippers properly with the shipping companies.
“The shippers council complaint unit also complain like we complain, they cannot bite, they can only complain to the shipping company that this is what is happening, when the company tell them it’s not so, they seat back and do nothing” he said.
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