Some principal officers of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), on Tuesday, lampooned the Association National President, Mr Tony Iju Nwabunike, over the recent query letter issued to his Deputy, Kayode Farinto over a purported letter written to the World Customs Organisation (WCO) which addresses the alleged discrepancies in valuation by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS).
Recall that Tony Iju Nwabunike had slammed a query on his Deputy, Kayode Farinto, asking him to “explain why severe disciplinary action(s) should not be taken against him on the following grounds: Writing a letter in the name of ANLCA to the Secretary-General of the World Customs Organisation (WCO), dated 03/08/020 with reference no ANLCA/WCO/VOL042/08/020 without the authority of the Association.”
In the query, the National President had explained that the said letter to the WCO which was not authorized by the National body was in total violation of section 3(a), (d) and (e) of the association constitution as amended; and that because sub-section 2(c) under section 7 of ANLCA constitution provides that the Deputy President is the Chairman of the National Disciplinary Committee of the association, he is hereby recused from this function as he cannot be a judge in his own case, in line with the principle of ” Nemo Judex In Causa Sha.
However reacting to the query letter, some members of the association who spoke to maritime journalists on Tuesday faulted the National President for slamming the query on his deputy, stating that the query letter was uncalled for because the WCO letter addressed issues affecting Customs brokers operation.
Speaking on the issue, the Coordinator, Western Zone of ANLCA, Mr John Offorbike, said the query letter was uncalled for because, like the National President, the Vice President also swore an oath to protect the interest of the members, which he has been carrying out.
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He explained that WCO is an organisation and not a court, therefore the vice president has the right to petition the organisation as a licensed Customs agent if the need arises.
Offorbike alleged that there is more to the query letter issued to the vice president and not as a result of the petition to WCO.
According to Oforbike, “The query letter was a surprise to me in the first place, because the vice president is very passionate about the welfare of the members which he swore an oath to protect. I believe there is something fishy behind the query because I don’t think the query came because Farinto wrote a letter to WCO.
“WCO is an organisation and not a court, so if you want to get information, you can write to them. Farinto in the first place is the National Vice President and a licensed Customs agent that is versed in cargo clearing procedure, so he only wrote the WCO for an explanation on a clearance bottleneck.
“So rather than looking at the messenger, let’s look at the message. Did he do anything contrary? Did he do anything anti-association? It’s unfortunate that the National President was not well advised, or else, how do we explain the query to his Vice President over a WCO letter that touches on issues affecting all of us?”
Also speaking on the issue, Chairman of the Tin-Can Chapter of ANLCA, Mr Segun Oduntan stated that “Did you go through the response of the Vice President to the query?, I think he raised some points affecting members of the association.
“The president should have looked at some of the issues raised rather than issuing a query letter, or even report it to the associations NEC for further deliberation.”
In his response to the query, Kayode Farinto, in a letter dated August 27th had stated that by virtue of being elected Vice President, he does not need any authorization before he can write to the WCO, while also stating that he acted in the overall interest of ANLCA in accordance with section 3 subsection (a) and (b) which deals with the aims and objectives of the Association.
While also alleging that the President has compromised his position to defend the interest of ANLCA members, Farinto accused the National President of betraying members of the Association in critical situations where his actions clearly showed he was working for other interests, a situation that prompted his writing a letter to the WCO.
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