‘How retired senior Customs officers fuel sharp practices at ports’

The Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) has revealed that most sharp practices at the ports, which include under-declaration and concealment of cargoes, are fuelled by retired senior Customs officers.

Speaking to the NigerianTribune exclusively, the National Publicity Secretary of ANLCA, Kayode Farinto, stated that allegiance of many junior Customs officers to the former bosses was the major reason government is losing so much in revenue at the ports.

According to him: “Many young Customs officers owe some now retired senior Customs officers for the opportunity to have even been enlisted into the Service in the first place. So, many of these senior officers, when retired, obtain Customs licence and use these young officers to evade outright payment on cargoes.

“It is very difficult for many of this young Customs officers to say ‘No’ to their benefactors. These young officers owe their enlistment into the Customs Service to these now retired senior officers. So, when such containers belonging to the retired senior Customs officers arrive ports manned by the young officers, such containers are skipped from examination, and allowed to leave the ports, like the case of the 440 pump action rifles container.

“Since the onus to call for cargo examination rests majorly on the Customs, many cargoes have exited the ports in this manner without anybody knowing. It was just by divine intervention that the 440 pump action rifles container was nabbed at Mile 2 axis of the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway. If not, who knows into whose hands those assorted weapons would have ended up now?

“Meanwhile, in most cases, similar containers filled with banned or dangerous products have exited the ports in the past without trace. Until the scenario of the pump action rifles, I am sure many did not know that some containers, when they arrive the ports, are granted privileged status by not being stemmed down for examination, and allowed to exit the ports without any form of payment. That had been the norm prior to the arrival of this present Customs boss. Even under his nose, pockets of such are still happening.

“In the case of under-declarations, cargoes are not totally exempted from examination. They are surface-checked and assumed to be what they are not, thereby allowing the owner pay cheaply what he or she should have paid heavily for.”

“Imagine a container carrying series of maybe 2016 SUV jeeps. On the Customs duty payment regulation, such vehicles ordinarily are expected to pay maybe N20million as duty paid value. To beat the system, the owner of such container approaches the inspecting Customs officers and give such officer maybe N2million. To ensure there is no hiccup, the officer informs the owner about his colleagues who are also on the same inspection chain.

“The Customs officer who has pocketed N2million knows that if he fails to inform his colleagues in that unit, he is bound to be exposed along that inspection line. So the cargo owner just end up spending around N5million to silence a chain of Customs cargo inspectors, thereby depriving the nation around N20million that could have accrued into the government coffers.”