The immediate past National President of the Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), Prince Olayiwola Shittu has waded into the controversies surrounding the tenure of the current members of the governing council of the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria CRFFN.
Shittu in an exclusive chat with Shipping Position Daily last week explained that the CRFFN Act stipulates two years for the council members, except for the first council members who had to run two years simultaneously to make four years.
Shittu, a pioneer member of the governing council, disclosed that, he had to resign from the first council when decisions about the council were becoming an issue. He alleged that some persons that were part of the first council are still the cause of the problem in CRFFN today.
“The Act is very clear; it is two years, except for the first council, we are going to have two councils, simultaneously to make four years, after that elections should come in every two years, that’s the provision of the Act”, he declared, even as he stated that anyone saying anything in the contrary is being dishonest.
“There is nothing more, anybody telling you after the first two years, there is going to be another two years, it can only happen in Nigeria, you know people interpret law to suit themselves and having been successfully selected to be on the council, then automatically it’s like a property handed over to you, nobody cares that even if you are not there, somebody else can do the work”.
“I was not interested in the first council after the first two tenures, mid-way, I had to resign when decisions about the council were becoming an issue, but I didn’t know a lot of people who still have the hangover of the past are still running after the council now, we were all together those years back, I didn’t even know they have their own plan and they know what they are looking for and that is why we are having problem in CRFFN”, he said.
Shittu’s verdict was in tandem with the recent statement of Alhaji Hakeem Olarenwaju, also a pioneer member and the second Chairman of the Council.
Alhaji Olarenwaju had also exclusively informed Shipping Position Daily also said recently that the National Assembly only approves two years for the governing council members.
He said: “I always believe in government constitution, when they said, two years tenure, immediately it was two years, some of our members were asking for tenure elongation, I said no, I can only do elongation if its gazzeted by the National Assembly. The National Assembly said two years for any chairman, so we left”.
