The National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders [NAGAFF] has advised the new Commissioner of Police, Ports Authority Police Command, Mrs. Sherifat Disu Olajoku on the need of profiling freight forwarders who transact business in the nation’s seaport as part of measures to reduce influx of people into the port.
Founder of the association Dr Boniface Aniebonam gave the suggestion yesterday when the new commissioner paid a courtesy visit to the NAGAFF headquarters in Apapa Lagos yesterday.
The National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders [NAGAFF] has advised the new Commissioner of Police, Ports Authority Police Command, Mrs. Sherifat Disu Olajoku on the need of profiling freight forwarders who transact business in the nation’s seaport as part of measures to reduce influx of people into the port.
Founder of the association Dr Boniface Aniebonam gave the suggestion yesterday when the new commissioner paid a courtesy visit to the NAGAFF headquarters in Apapa Lagos yesterday.
His suggestion was in reaction to the decision of the new Commissioner that she was desirous of reducing the number of people in the port environment.
Aniebonam said that there is the need for risk profiling of freight forwarders who have businesses at the port.
He recalled the recent raid and arrest of innocent freight forwarder by the combined team of Customs and the Police which he described as a failure on the part of the police.
According to him, the new commissioner was appointed to the port at a time when there has been absolute peace and tranquility in the ports; he called for synergy between the Nigerian Police and the critical stakeholders of the industry.
‘’There is the need for risk management and profiling, the commissioner of police had been here and we have noted this idea, there is need for synergy between the Police and the critical stakeholders through the organized bodies like NAGAFF, ANLCA and you need to sit down with them, let them give you the registers of their members and you profile them’’.
‘’When I used the word profiling, you need to get their passports, you need to get the data concerning their operations ‘’, he suggested.
However Aniebonam reiterated that funding is a major problem to carry out such responsibility even as he also called on President Goodluck Jonathan that, ‘’we recommend that the 1% CISS usually paid to the service providers should be upgraded to 2% and to be converted to Police Trust Fund’’.
Earlier in her remark, the Commissioner of Police, Ports Authority Command, Mrs. Sherifat Disu Olajoku stressed that NAGAFF has come to sanitize the freight forwarding practice assuring that the police will work with stakeholders in ensuring that the ports become a healthy environment.
She said that the port police will work with other sister agencies to synergize on how to make the port safe.
According to her, ‘’what I want to do in this my tenure as C.P here, is that there are so many people in the ports that have nothing doing. I want to sanitize that to make sure that those people who do not have anything to do in the ports are not allowed access to our ports’’.
“We will try our best to cooperate with NAGAFF to weed out all those people that we think are not required to be there, because it is actually helping us in doing our jobs in the preventive aspect of criminal activities ‘’.
I want to make sure that the ports are rid of those people who are not supposed to be there and that the place would be made conducive for those who actually have business at the port’’, she stressed.
Also speaking, president of NAGAFF, Mr Eugene Nweke called on the Commissioner to know those that have businesses in the port even as he added that there is the need to know the data of NAGAFF members in other to address the issue of security in the ports.
According to him, NAGAFF has maintained a very good relationship with the Nigerian Police both within and outside the port environment, because the association believes in strategic partnership with agencies of the government.
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