Import Duty On Rice:

The Shippers Association Lagos State yesterday called for a clean-up of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to weed out “businessmen in uniforms’’, who connived with rice import duty evaders.
The president of the association, Mr Jonathan Nicol, made the call in an interview in Lagos.
The shipper said that those customs officers that connived with evaders of duty on rice from the borders should be brought to book for making the policy “anti-productive’’.
He said that if not for the compromise with the importers of rice through the borders, customs revenue in the past five months would have doubled.
According to him, the ban on rice coming through the land borders will obviously affect the Seme Border Customs revenue.
“Seme command of Customs raked in over N1 billion last month (February) because all the components were functional,’’ Nicol said.
The comptroller-general of Customs, Retired Col. Hameed Ali, on Tuesday said that his officers and men could not be totally exonerated from the abuse associated with the implementation of the order on rice.
Ali said that his office had been inundated with reports of collusion between some customs officers and rice importers.
The comptroller-general had directed investigation into the reports, insisting that indicted personnel would be sanctioned.
The Customs had on Tuesday in a statement issued by its Spokesman, Mr Wale Adeniyi, announced a re-introduction of the restriction order on importation of rice through the land borders.
According to the statement, the comptroller-general gave an approval for the reversal of an earlier policy in October 2015 which allowed rice imports through the land borders, once appropriate duty and charges were paid.
The service said that the dwindling revenue from rice imports through the land borders did not match the volume of rice landed in neighbouring ports.
“Rather, reports from border commands indicated an upsurge in the tempo of rice smuggling.
“Implementation of the restriction order got off to a smooth start with a high level of compliance in October 2015. However, revenue started dwindling from January 2016, with importers blaming access to Forex as major impediments,’’ it said.
The NCS said that during the five-month period when the importation was allowed, between October 2015 to March 17, 2016, 24.992 tonnes of rice valued at N 2.33billion were imported through the land borders.
It said that during the period, total revenue generated amounted to N1.68 billion.
“This is considerably lower than the revenue projected to be generated with
the removal of import restrictions,’’ the service said.
The NCS, however, said that an upsurge in the number of seizures had been reported across the land borders since January 2016.
“In the first two months of 2016, a total of 9,238 bags were seized, with Duty Paid Value of N64.66 million made by the Customs anti-smuggling patrol teams of Federal operations and Border commands.
“The comptroller-general noted that his officers and men cannot be totally exonerated from the abuse associated with the implementation of the order on rice, as his office has been inundated with reports of collusion between them and rice importers.
“He has directed investigation into the reports, insisting that indicted
personnel will be sanctioned.
“The comptroller-general directed a zero-tolerance to rice imports through the land borders irrespective of volume with immediate effect.
“He also said that importers who had already initiated import processes would have a grace period ending Friday, March 25, 2016, to clear their consignments,’’ the service said.