The Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) has called for the sack of the three service providers and the cancellation of the Risk Assessment Report (RAR), saying that the whole essence of engaging them in the process of customs duty collection and cargo clearance has been defeated by the activities of the Nigeria Customs Service.
Speaking the minds of members of his association, the national president of ANLCA, Prince Olayiwola Shittu last week at a ceremony to mark the first 100 days in office of the present national executive committee of the association said that the RAR has lost its relevant and should be discarded.
The RAR is usually issued by service providers to importers as a document to guide the Nigeria Customs Service in the process of cargo examination and payment pf import duty.
But Shittu alleged that the service providers, namely Cotecna, SGS and Globalscan have been using the instrumentality of RAR to shore up their income by jacking up the value of imports and payable duty, since they are paid a percentage of total value of imports.
“RAR as an instrument of clearing has lost its relevance, the reason being that if you put in your invoice no matter what your name is and how authentic your invoice is, the service providers have over time been jacking up the value”, he stated.
He alleged further that the Nigeria Customs Service has also added to the irrelevance of RAR by deliberately disrespecting values on the document even though they have already been increased by the service providers.
Stressing that RAR does not have final say in he process of determining duty on imported consignment, the ANLCA boss said: “the RAR is not even a final document, they tell us it is advisory. So after jacking up all these, Customs will still tell you that value is low, so what is the relevance of RAR?”
“Sincerely, let us ask ourselves if a RAR is still useful, because when they started, it was supposed to be the instrument for the payment of duty, but now Customs don’t look at it because government has given them (Customs) a target and any other instrument does not matter, they can just look at your goods and say no the value is low, its either you leave it there or you pay the difference and move.”
According to him, since the Nigeria Customs Service no longer respects the judgement of service providers on values, then the continued relevance of RAR is questionable. He stressed that it is the usual practice of Customs officers in the valuation unit to query values on the RAR and that this practice has always put importers and their clearing agents at the mercy of unscrupulous customs officers who often take advantage of the situation.
(Please turn to pages 6 and 7 for full interview)
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