Every year the Nigeria Customs Service is given a revenue target by the Federal Government and almost every year, the target is surpassed and for this, the Service’s Comptroller General gets accolade from his employers.
Every year the Nigeria Customs Service is given a revenue target by the Federal Government and almost every year, the target is surpassed and for this, the Service’s Comptroller General gets accolade from his employers.
In 2011, the Service ‘broke’ revenue records when by the end of October of that year; it had already met its target of N596 Billion. The Service excitedly announced that “as at the end of October 2011, the Service has generated a total of N602 Billion into the Federation Account. By the end of the year, we hope to have generated bonus revenue of over N100 Billion into Government Coffers”.
And buoyed by this achievement, it set for itself an unprecedented target of N1.2Trillion for 2012, even though, it was given a target of N800Billion by the federal government.
To meet that target, it created a novel idea of benchmarking duties that are payable on about 23 items and with that, the battle line was drawn with its immediate publics; the importers and their licensed agents.
The decision culminated into what may be described as the toughest battle to be fought by the CG of Customs, Alhaji Dikko Abdulahi Inde since coming into office about five years ago. It’s not that the he has not had issue with its immediate stakeholders, notably, importers and licensed customs agents, but the raging face-off over the introduction of duty benchmark elicited more than a passing reaction.
And to douse tension, the CG organized a two- legged stakeholders’ forum, first with licensed customs agents and the second was with importers; both events held in Lagos.
According to the customs, the idea is to discourage importers and their freight forwarders from engaging in under-declaration or concealment which many importers commit in a bid to evade payment of correct duties.
By its own calculation, with the duty benchmark, importers will be compelled to pay uniform duty on certain categories of goods, irrespective of the quantity declared by the respective importer.
Although at the meeting with the licensed customs agents, the Customs boss appealed that the benchmark policy was largely misunderstood, because according to him, benchmark only concerns the cargo and not its value, but this did not quite convince the importers who asked for more time before implementation could start.
If the introduction of benchmark generated furore, its cancellation is likely to generate more anxiety.
At a function of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) last week, Customs Assistant Comptroller General in charge of Zone A, Mr Victor Gbemudu who stood in for the CG told the licensed customs agents that the Service will henceforth strictly enforce sections 46, 47, and 164 of the Customs and Exercise Management Act (CEMA) to enforce and seize any goods that is not properly declared.
I an apparent reference to the link between the N1Trillion target and the benchmark, the ACG had stressed that: “The custom needs this duty and the bottom line is that this N1trillion is achievable and we can realize it, I want you all to partner with us to get this target”.
“Please talk to those importers because the days of evasion of duty is over, the government needs the money to carry out developmental projects, the Custom of today is not the Customs of yesteryears, the days of frivolities are over, advice the importers to please pay these duties”, he had added.
And with the above one is made to believe that the Nigeria Customs Service will henceforth tighten the noose on fraudulent importers and their licensed customs agent collaborators.
As much as one is sympathetic with the Customs, the fact is that its action is a further confirmation of the age- long fact that there is a high level collusion between its officers and licensed customs agents and even importers.
The decision to now collect maximum duty can only mean one thing and that is that it can actually collect more than it collects every year and that a chunk of what it collects may have been going to private coffers.
The CG of Customs has a moral burden to prove this wrong by not only surpassing the N800Billion government target, but by also meeting its self-imposed N1Trillion target.
As for importers and licensed customs agents, what is bad in doing correct declaration, if customs says it wants to collect al accruable duty, why not? And if the Service wants to enforce relevant sections of CEMA, why not.
It’s high time all stakeholders in the business of importation did the right thing and that is by respecting the import guidelines and all extant laws governing that business.
Discussion about this post