“The Customs that we need is not one that not only does its job professionally, but also lives up to its billing as the prime agency at the nation’s ports, by actively seeking solutions to the challenges that port users face and advising government proactively on them. “We can’t afford to keep losing trade and revenue to neighbouring countries as we currently do.”
“The Customs has been rated low in the area of trade facilitation. It has been blamed for obstructing free flow of trade into and out of Nigeria. There is definitely room for improvement and there are still some officers and men that give the service a bad name”.
“Much more has to be done and be seen to have been done to change the negative public perception of the service. Our goal remains the attainment of 48- hour clearance of goods at the ports as well as port decongestion. Without the achievement of these goals, the image of the Customs shall remain negative, rightly or wrongly.”
With the above words and coupled with the confirmation that an earlier task force that was given a similar mandate about one year ago failed to deliver, the stage was recently set for yet another committee to (once again) tinker with the fate of the Nigeria Customs Service.
The now-disbanded task force which was headed by a one-time Customs boss and incumbent deputy chairman of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr Bello Haliru Mohammed also had another Customs Comptroller General, Alhaji Hammed Aliyu Mustapha as member.
We recall that just like the finance minister charged the current task force which is headed a former permanent secretary in the ministry of finance, Mr. Ochi Achinivu, one of his predecessors, had similarly charged the Bello Mohammed task force to reorganise and transform the Service into a modern institution that is capable of enhancing revenue generation and trade facilitation.
The previous task force has been accused of under performing and turning- in an interim report without “great cohesion and cooperation”; an indication that the confidence that was reposed in the committee was unjustifiable and [probably misplaced. It is also a confirmation of the widely- held belief that the Dr Bello Mohammed’s task force was constituted with a single veiled task of ensuring the emergence of the incumbent Comptroller General of Customs, Alhaji Abdullahi Dikko Inde who coincidentally is marking his one year in office.
The Nigeria Customs Service is arguably the only Federal agency that has seen the highest number of task forces; they come with each successive administration and they succeed in enthroning a Customs boss.
A few examples will suffice here and will certainly justify our fears that the new task force may not be nay different from the ones before it.
The emergence in 1994 of Brigadier General Samuel Ango (rtd) as the successor to Dr Bello Mohammed as the Sole Administrator of Nigeria Customs Service was on account of alleged decay (in the Customs) on the part of the –then military government and the need to reorganise the Service.
Gen. Ango was succeeded by Alhaji Ahmed Mustapha and as soon as he (Mustapha) filed notice of retirement, the then-minister of state for finance, Mrs Esther Nenadi Usman was made the chairman of a task force to (again) reform the Nigeria Customs Service. The Nenadi Usman committee was responsible for the mass retirement of several senior officers and the infamous accelerated promotions of some officers. The reform also led to the emergence of Elder Jacob Gyang Buba as the Comptroller General.
Gyang Buba served until the exit of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, and as soon as he left, ‘arrangements’ began for a successor to Gyang Buba. In the interim, the lot fell on both Dr Bernard Shaw Nwadialo and Alhaji Hamman Bello respectively and they served briefly until the Dr Bello Mohammed task force completed its work and the subsequent emergence of the incumbent CG of Customs , Alhaji Abdullahi Dikko.
From the above, it is obvious that the present attempt to reform the Nigeria Customs Service is the third since 2003; a development which tends to question the rationale behind the frequent rush to reform the Service.
While not arguing that the Nigeria Customs Service is the best federal agency in Nigeria, we are however certain that the current efforts are suspicious of a pre-determined position by the government. There are insinuations that the new task force has yet one assignment.
This newspaper had reasons to ask some salient questions last year when the Dr Bello Mohammed task force was inaugurated. The questions are still very germane. Why are other agencies and paramilitary bodies not subjected to the frequent reforms as the Nigeria Customs Service?, if the Nenadi Usman body could not midwife a better Customs after all the assurances, and the Dr Mohammed’s task force could not do it, what assurances do we have that the new group can turn the Customs around.
We hope we are wrong, but everything point to the possibility of failure and acting out a pre-determined script.
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