When the first part of this interview was published, we got a few calls and SMS. Not all were complimentary, some labelled us as sycophantic. But majority commended our efforts; especially looking at the quantum of space that we devoted to the personality of Dr Aniebonam. As a matter of fact, it was not by coincidence that we devoted our editorial opinion, vox pop and interview pages to him and it was not him, per se, but because of the lessons that could be learnt from his actions and inactions. The concluding part of the interview takes us deeper into the ideals of the founder, pioneer president and now former chairman Board of Trustees of NAGAFF.
What informed the formation of NAGAFF?
First of all, I will like to say that you do know that I had a background with the Nigeria Customs Service. When I left them, the immediate opportunity I had was to go into transport logistics and custom formalities, if not for any other thing, but because, I am conversant with customs procedures. So, I immediately initiated a company; Aniebonam organization limited and our business were very simple, we were involved in the clearing of goods in and out of the ports. Along the line, I discovered that there are certain anomalies in the port that I never liked; particularly matters that had to do with corruption using the frame work of intimidation and I thought it was necessary for me to now look for a frame work, an institution that is well established and what came to my mind immediately was the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents, of course it was the only association that was dully registered propagating clearing and forwarding procedures in Nigerian ports. I met with the then chairman, Apapa chapter, that is Onyebuchi Katsina Uzor and asked him to create a committee that I will head and that committee was called the welfare committee. You could see clearly now that I was not happy with the way agents were being maltreated in the port and what came to my mind was that how can I provide welfare using my wealth of experience. That committee was immediately established and it was headed by me, I took a lot of time going into the port, trying to look at issues that have to do with intimidation and extortion among practicing agents and that was how it started. And sometime about one or two years after, the headquarters of ANLCA started having files on my activities as regards the welfare of practicing agents and they decided to create a higher responsibility. I was made chairman, customs agents relations committee , here again I had the responsibility to link up with the agencies of the government that have to do with port functions and we began to create some level of responsible partnership because all of us have to work in harmony. There is something that I never liked; firstly my background with the customs and then I recall that Alhaji Sani Kamba (then ANLCA national president) was also from the customs and there was this scandal of non-IDR and I was not happy the way Kamba handled that matter because a lot of agents and importers were arrested and even a lot of customs officers were arrested too. I became very unhappy because I do know that the Nigeria Customs Service has all it takes to carry out an in house enquiry, this did not work, because somebody somewhere probably the management of ANLCA at that time seem to have aligned themselves with the then- minister of finance Chief Anthony Ani and eventually the matter was taken to the police to handle and many people were arrested. Ordinarily, I expected the association to go to court and get a get an order to restrain the government from doing so because these goods were formally cleared out of customs control and it is wrong for anybody to come back and impose duty sanctions. Importers were asked to pay N600,000 per 20- foot container and N1.2million for 40 foot- containers but the fact remains that these goods had been cleared out of customs control and the grouse was that somebody somewhere was telling the government that the goods that were released from the ports were containerized goods, no doubt about that but there was what we call groupage in shipping procedures, which means that one to five people can have their consignments in a container. I recall that time that containers were being unstuffed and each of the consignees would take delivery of their containers from the various ships, but because somebody somewhere was trying to become relevant by playing the good boy, the government were made to understand that the goods were cleared as a whole; which was wrong and I was not happy about that. I tried to talk to the management of ANLCA on what we are supposed to do but some of them seem to have more interest to protect than what we are talking about and because of that I started thinking something else. At that point, it became necessary for me now to look for a better machinery or a better platform to propagate a better port operation that will create friendship among the major stakeholders in the industry. Again I was not too happy with the name: Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agent because from all information made available to me, the name sounds absurd when you look at international shipping, I wouldn’t subscribe to a situation where you are called a license customs clearing agent and when you go out of this country nobody understands what you are talking about and that was the reason why we took to that freight forwarding nomenclature and I immediately put into machinery the registration of that organization.
But you had the opportunity to join the National Council of Managing Directors, why did you not?
Yes there was national council, but the national council to me, does not solve the problem, if you understand what I just said in terms of nomenclature. Besides that, as for the national council of managing directors, after the revocation of the licenses of the agents, it was an agreed norm that the council should serve as a policy group of ANLCA and so if you look at their membership you will agree with me that its just a mere duplication; there is Association of Nigerian License Custom Agent whose membership is based on licenses issued by the Nigeria Customs Service, council of managing directors of licensed customs agent, whose membership is populated by the managing directors of the customs licensed companies. So, the best that we can get out of national council is to use them as a policy group because one will assume out rightly that managing directors of companies are policy persons and so if we can gather together under this body, we can advice ANLCA on how to go about some things, so it was a platform.
What were the difficulties and challenges you had in creating NAGAFF?
I think it’s quite good that you are the one interviewing me today because I recall that when we made the first move to address MARAN members, I remember that you passed a comment that NAGAFF is not likely to last more than three months, so its quiet an opportunity for me to thank you for the tonic you provided because that was exactly the tonic I needed to strive very hard, I saw it as a challenge to make sure that NAGAFF is an association to beat as it is today.
We came on board with every intention to effect a change; change is something that you know is normally resisted, so it was not a new thing to me because I know that there will be resistance, so to me it wasn’t all that a serious problem because I had all ready prepared my mind towards all these challenges and that was why you see that throughout my leadership in NAGAFF as president up till now, there has never been a major break down of law and order, because I am a trained customs officer, if you know any officer that is properly trained, there is what we call the seven C’s of the custom, that seven C’s is an abbreviation of guides that at any situation, you must know what to do, I used that and the challenges were solved. Having said this, those challenges you are looking at means that we are coming into the ports and saying so many things that people wouldn’t want to be discussed. For instance, we said that the number of government agencies in the port is a hell of duplication, a lot of members of our sister association; particularly the leadership of that association were involved in unorthodox practices, for instance those who refused customs examination, no body wants to pay custom duty but the point I was trying to make was very simple: in an attempt to go through unwholesome practices, you will be endangering the product and the ultimate is seizure. So, you find out a lot of importers are losing their imports because of sharp practices. Here again, the truth remains that many people are not conversant with custom laws, for instance if you go to section 46 and 47 of CEMA, it is talking about instances of concealment, false declaration, undervaluation of goods and so on, the punishment upon conviction is five years imprisonment. But how many people know about that, a lot of people are not conversant with the law, they are not familiar with customs procedures, so a lot of us keep on endangering our life and behaving in a manner that can take us to prison every day. Again, this is an opportunity to thank the Customs for tampering justice with mercy most of the time.
When you left ANLCA, the feeling was that you were a rebel and that you abandoned ANLCA because you had a personal ambition to build an empire, is that true?
I think for now you could see that the issue of personal ambition does not come in because after six yeas as president of NAGAFF, I relinquished my position, here again as the chairman board of NAGAFF, I relinquished my position and today finally, I am exiting from association matters. That means I have come to pass a message to the people and I can tell you; except anybody who wants to deceive himself or herself, the emergence of NAGAFF in the port industry activities has turned around the ports.
What kind of a person is Dr. Boniface Aniebonam?
I might not be in the position to tell you the kind of person I am, but rather you should go by way of investigative journalism and that will help you a lot to trace me back from my childhood, secondary and primary school, the way I studied at the college of agriculture, my stay in the customs. I don’t take stupid things from anybody, I hate injustice and humiliation, I hate oppression and anything you think you can do to curry advantage to yourself over me, and to crown it all, I am not into money worshipping and that is one thing you must know about me. I take joy in creating wealth and seeing that people are happy, what makes me happy as a human being is that I see people very happy, when people are not happy, I get worried and I can as well tell you that I get upset because there is no reason for that as far as I am concerned. I don’t want to say much about this, but the truth of the matter is that I have come to liberate the freight forwarders and I can tell you that this has been achieved and the achievement can be linked directly to the emergence of the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding.
What will you consider as the greatest contribution of NAGAFF to the freight forwarding industry?
The enactment of the legislature to regulate the practices of freight forwarding in Nigeria, it is the baby of NAGAFF; anybody can come outside and say one thing or the other. I also recall when Chief Adebayo Sarumi the then- managing director of Shippers Council tried to open the register of freight forwarders, I told him you cannot do that because the law that established the shippers council does not given you the powers, so it was after the meeting between me, Usman Sanusi the then -deputy president and the president of FIATA at Eko le meridian Hotel, we had Ojo Maduekwe then as the minister of transport, we all agreed that there is only one solution to this nightmare and that is for the National Assembly to pass a legislation to regulate the practices of freight forwarding in Nigeria. Because of several crises, there seems to be no single association that speaks for the industry practitioners and so the easiest way to do that is through a legislation so that we can boast of being professionals, after that meeting, the president of FIATA left and met with Ojo Maduekwe; I am telling you this because Ojo Maduekwe is still alive, after his meeting with FIATA president who was on his way back to Zurich he called us and said we have concluded the meeting, now there is need for us to articulate a body that will regulate freight forwarding in Nigeria because FIATA can not just deal with anybody, again I can corroborate that, the current chairman of the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding, Tony Iju Nwabunike was at the last conference of FIATA and when it got to Nigeria’s turn for introduction, the president of FIATA was simply asking them what about NAGAFF and they were shocked. They came back and were telling us. So anybody can come now and say one thing or the other.
Are you satisfied with what the Council has turned out to be?
The council is doing the much it can do because many of the Nigerian people are still basking in the euphoria of democracy, one good advantage that NAGAFF had was the leadership quality and of course I never bordered so much to talk about the issues of finances, nobody was asked to contribute money and all that. I only made sure that the ‘think tank’ of NAGAFF were simply gathered and I provide the logistics and that was why we got to the level where we are today, if we had gone to the level of people contributing money and all that instances of accountability can even delay us for another one year. I had a goal and a mission and God provided the logistics.
I asked about the Council…..
Yes, that’s what I am saying; I have old you about Nigerians basking in the euphoria of democracy. For over six months, they were questioning whether Tony Nwabunike had an executive power as a chairman and so it was an internal struggle until they were able to get the registrar in the person of Mike Jukwe. You can see how long it took them to do these interpretations, meanwhile many of these people that are inside the council are not conversant with the impediments of the council and so it took them time to really understand and most of the things you see going on the council was when NAGAFF injected some fresh blood into it that is what we can call consultants. Usman Sanusi the current president of NAGAFF was injected, Eugene Nweke was injected, Increase Uche was injected into the council because we are the key and of course the shippers council are bestowed with good minds they knew what we were saying and that is why you can now begin to hear the council’s name as far as I am concerned. I will say again that we will still go into it because there are things that the council must do to survive.
The council has started registering freight forwarding associations, how legal is this?
Yes it is legal, the associations are to be registered with the council, There is no doubt about it, the law has provided for that but, the associations themselves that are well established like NAGAFF and ANLCA, National council, IFFN are the raw materials for the council and therefore the council cannot succeed if these associations are not giving their support.
Concluded
Discussion about this post