It was the first meeting with the media since its inauguration in August 18, 2007 and so it was termed a ‘Ground – Breaking’ press conference which also featured the formal unveiling of its new registrar. Expectedly, the press briefing which was organized by the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria has been generating reactions, especially from freight forwarders. Various comments kept pouring – in throughout last week.
To set the records straight; less the media will once again be accused of quoting anyone out of context, we present the responses of the chairman, Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN), Mr Tony Nwabunike to some of the questions that were fired at him.
He was assisted by the Council’s chairman, publicity committee, Prince Olayiwola Shittu who also answered some questions. But since he spoke on behalf of the chairman, we attribute all responses to Mr. Tony Nwabunike.
The CRFFN and freight forwarding associations
First of all, there are some people in our industry whom we must have to thank, and if you look at some names like chief Ernest Elochukwu representing the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), we can see Mr. Lucky Amiwero representing Council of Managing Directors, we can see Dr. Boniface Aniebonam representing NAGAFF, also we can see Zebulon Ikokide representing the Institute of Freight Forwarders of Nigeria, to mention but few. We are just one year old, just barely above a year and what we are saying today is that the presidents of these associations actually contributed not just financially but they also invested their time to see that the bill gets to become an Act. If I give you the original documents of the council, you will see all these names there in. The problems that you think we are having is that we have not started registration, it is not because Dr Aniebonam is not here, he has been by me, assisting and cooperating with the council to see that the freight forwarders get registered and have one voice, and chief Elochukwu as you already know is a member of this Council. I have a little problem with the Council of Managing Directors; not just because of Tony Iju Nwabunike, but because, Lucky Amiwero has gone to court; he went to court because he felt aggrieved, he contested the election, but the truth of the matter is that not everybody will win an election, we were more than 50 and only 10 of us were actually elected, and to tell you the truth I was the last person to be elected, I got only 60 points, Dr. Boniface Aniebonam got 59 votes, while Lucky got 57 votes. And I can remember three votes were voided which means that Tony Nwabunike would not have been in the council if those three votes were counted, its just sheer luck. So I actually went to my brother whom I have so much respect for; I sat down with Lucky Amiwero and said ‘my president, please this thing has happened, what do we do?, I even wrote a memo to the minister of transport telling him that there are people I still need to bring into the council. They asked me who and I mentioned Lucky Amiwero, I mentioned Dr. Aniebonam, Ikokide and two others, they said I should go and put a memo so I went, when we were doing that the minister said somebody cannot be taking you to court and you are putting him in the council, can you just go and remove the court action so that you can come on board, four times we held a meeting in Abuja and he refused to come, Aniebonam called a meeting and told Lucky to drop that court case, even the minister called a meeting through Captain Adamu Biu to mediate, some of you know what happened after that. I just want to elaborate this to show you the truth about the council, its not just that I want to dwell so much on it but I want to elaborate, Lucky Amiwero is highly regarded in this council but we should put our pride out of this thing, if you build a house, you ought to be allowed into that house, you ought to be a member of the household, and I want him to be a member of this household, it is not a sign of weakness because the Act is clearly there, if you go to section 4 you will see the powers of this council on individuals and associations, today it is Tony Iju Nwabunike as chairman, tomorrow it can be anybody. We are moving, we are extending our hands for people to come in so that we can have a formidable council.
Electing the remaining members of the Council
You can see that now we have got a registrar, immediately after this, the registrar will commence registration of members, these are the people that will be elected into the council, and this should be done latest by April. About 15 people are to be elected, 5 from east, west and Northern zone both airport and land border post, after registration of members, these 15 people will come onboard.
Customs licenses and CRFFN
There is no conflict between the Customs and the Council, there is a law establishing customs which is CEMA and we have an Act for the regulation of freight forwarding. As it’s done in other countries; even in America, customs don’t license, it is the regulatory body that gives you the authority to practice as a freight forwarder. If customs should license you and yet you are not registered by the council then you are not a freight forwarder, so eventually the customs will rely on you being registered by the council before you can get a license, all these will work out by themselves in due course.
Federal government’s logo on CRFFN letterhead and the role of government in the council
We are trying to project ourselves according to the Act, if you look at the Act, the logo is there, we can as well come up with another logo, but I don’t think the logo means government tells us what to do, they have given us an Act to work on so the logo is not the issue, the issue is us implementing the Act to the letter. Let me also quickly add this, the government in the council is not a problem because the government itself is well represented in the council, but there is an internal mechanism in this Act that does not allow government to say ‘until we do this by ourselves, in fact there is a clause that says that “the minister of transport will convey his wish to the council”, with a proviso that the council can act on it or reject it; the idea is to make sure that the council is self- sustained, autonomous in decision making for the overall interest of the maritime industry.
CRFFN and existing associations, can they work in harmony
The solution is to synchronize them and bring them to professional standard. The first thing you need to know is that the Act empowers the council to register associations, to regulate their activities to co-exist with the objectives of the Act itself. Presently, they are not even registered because we are just commencing registration, and then the council is preparing a code of conduct for members, as soon as those things are in place, we will also have a tribunal to try members, you will now discover that this council is carrying a lot of responsibilities to fine-tune the activities of the associations themselves, you are going to see a new face of these associations. If you go to America or to the UK, you will see that apart from the regulatory body, they still have their associations, but all the associations are still supervised by the council, you will discover that no association will conduct elections without referring to the council or else you will not be recognized, even their internal democracy is supervised by the council. Eventually, the association will just stand as a lobbying group where they will be able to tell their members how to represent them in the council, so there is not going to be a conflict, the associations will be the best for it as soon as the arrangement is in place.
If the Custom does not license a freight forwarder, but the person is registered with you, can such person practice?
Yes. Let me tell you, the law is very straight forward, you can practice as a freight forwarder, the only thing you cannot do is practice as a customs agent, customs agency is part of freight forwarding in a chain, but you need to be a registered freight forwarder which is more important to you than being a licensed agent.
The Council is dominated by ANLCA members
You have to know that democracy is what obtains in the country now, and the election that was conducted was not based on registered members, it was based on practitioners, now that we are going to register people and these other arm of freight forwarding are going to get registered, the numbers will enable each arm of the freight forwarding industry to be represented. The purpose of appointment by the government is to have geographical spread and take cognizance of the transporters if you are registered, you cannot even go to the port to transport if your private company is not registered with the council, its going to go to that level.
Council’s plans for freight forwarders
The most important thing is: what does a registered freight forwarder stand to gain, the first thing is respect, the second is professionalism, the third is training, career advancement, protection from exploitation. As long as there is a code of conduct and you are able to operate within that code and do not flout the law, you should be protected, I can assure you that a registered member will be better than what we have today. For instance, let us go back to the enforcement that the customs is doing now on duty collection, it takes two to tangle, but three can tangle better, all the news we hear is that agents have done this and that, but between you and I, we know that there is no form of fraud that can be perpetrated without help from these agencies; not just the customs but all the security agencies, when government now calls the agents to come and say what has been distributed within the security agencies, what has government done to these agencies. These are some of the protection which eventually the council will give to the average practitioner whom today is seen as a fraud and as if they don’t even have a right, and the right they do not have now is because we are being oppressed by the instrument of power that government has, there is no agent that can resist arrest even if he is being arrested illegally or wrongly, the government knows what is wrong within the ports. Right from the time of Kema Chikwe as transport minister, we have been challenging them to come out and follow an average agent in the process of goods clearance and see how much of government money goes to the security agencies, but they shy away from it because they know. We have come to a conclusion that, maybe that’s the way of government to placate the uniformed members of the government service.
Subvention and funding from governmentI
commend the Honorable minister of transport, Alhaji Adamu Biu who has determined that this council must start operations; this council was created just like a helpless baby who has been abandoned, so the man has decided to give us a helping hand. I also have to let you know that the subvention is not in millions as some people think, it is adequate enough for the chairman to be able to travel around, the council itself is self- generating and don’t forget that the council members themselves are not more than 50 in the long run.
Burden of double payment on freight forwarders who pay license renewal fees to customs and also to the council
Anyone who engages in the business of freight forwarding across international borders is a freight forwarder, but you can be a transporter without being a license customs agent, but once you want to be a licensed customs agent and carry out other functions as freight forwarders, you must do so. Let me tell you that even if you want to become an engineer, there is an amount that you pay to your associations, today the customs is asking for N200, 000 licensing fees which used to be N10, 000, but tomorrow the same people can decide that the money should be reduced, it is their right. But the fees we are asking our members to pay are the ones we know they can afford, as a freight forwarder. It can take care of lunch for two of you and that is equivalent of the money a freight forwarder will have to pay a year, we do not have any problem with that and that is why we are calling on our people to come into agreement on the type of fees that they will be happy to pay and then we move on, and don’t lets forget that the fees you pay today can not be static; in another 10 years, it may not be the same amount.
Discussion about this post