Aloy Uchegbu (NAGAFF Sec., PTML Chapter)
CRFFN belongs to the freight forwarders, but government is making a big mistake, they are seeing CRFFN as a parastatal of the federal ministry of transport which is wrong, because of their interference, over-bearing influence, that is why almost everything is going wrong in CRFFN, leave CRFFN to the people that owns it to run it, and let them play their supervisory roles, then you will see that everything will work out fine. The federal ministry of transport is supposed to know what is happening in CRFFN, not to control the council, because they have no business appointing chief executives or determining who becomes chairman, the council is for us, the government cannot be at the top and also at the ground level at the same time, they are just to guide them and not to interfere in their matters.
Osita Chukwu (Chairman; SNFFIEC)
The only way they can resolve the crises is by appointing an icon to manage CRFFN and by using good people to manage them, bringing people from different sectors, removing the corrupt ones and bringing in the uncorrupt people from different sectors of government to fill in the gaps of CRFFN in order to energize them. If you do not rebrand the sector and decide to continue with the corrupt people, nothing will be made out of the Council, the government should rebrand the Council by bringing the likes of permanent secretaries, retirees, or some directors that are still serving, with this put in place, CRFFN will become a better place.
Joseph Anabaraonye (Registrar, FFAN)
One of the major problems of CRFFN is lawlessness and because the people that are there are determined to implement what is in their minds and not what is in the CRFFN Act, that is what has taken us to the issue of a sole administrator, this is alien to the Act, it does not recognise such appointment and if it is taken to the court, it is really lawlessness, considering the way the CRFFN has been subject to the minister, everything in the council is minister, that is another problem entirely. But I think the best option is for the minister and whosoever that are there to send the list of all the members, call them for a meeting, whereby the election can be conducted, it can be done only with the raising of hands, it is stated in the Act already that election can be made with the raising up of hands, therefore the members should be called together and the elections should be conducted.
Cosmas Ndimkora (NAGAFF Chair, PTML)
Like NAGAFF founder would say, CRFFN started on a wrong foothold, so we need to begin from the scratch in order to get it right by doing it the way it was fashioned out. The problem is that there is politics in everything in this country.
Uche increase (National Sec., NAGAFF)
The greatest achievement recorded so far was the tenacity which Prince Olayiwola Shittu put up in order to retrieve the council from the plan of governing council to elongate their tenure, now that they are out of there, we need to sustain the simple style of bringing the razzmatazz in the council, there should be a lot of precaution, the minister should adopt a lot of caution. What we expect the minister to do is to work in connection with the great minds that started the council from the scratch, the re-composition of the council should not be rushed at all, NAGAFF has been in the vanguard that whatever has to be done should be done the right way. So the major thing to do now is to make the council's Act functional, abiding by the position of the council Act, we need people to fill in the governing council but not just selecting people on political basis, the place should not be manned by politicians like the way it was before because I have not seen the contributions they have made so far, and right now we need knowledgeable people in freight forwarding practice that will make impact in order to move the sector forward.
Ugochukwu Nnadi (NAGAFF)
After the dissolution of the governing council, the minster gave two months to appoint a new governing council, but I will urge him to give them 90 days because the two months is not enough. The problem with CRFFN is not the members, but the governing council that are there, all they were concerned about was money, and by the time you put the right people according to the Council's Act, CRFFN will become a better place. The Act was well fashioned-out , with good intentions but unfortunately, at the point of implementation, we all know the Nigerian factor, by the time the room for election comes in, everybody will one way or the other want to contest for a post and thereafter become concerned with the money.
Emeka Enwelu (Licensed Freight Forwarder)
The minister of transport should first of all interrogate the dissolved governing council in areas of acknowledged membership fees that were paid into the council's bank account. The council should go back to the scratch and act according to the Act that established it.
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