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The Nigeria Customs Service on Thursday, November 20, opened the 2025 Comptroller-General of Customs’ Conference in Abuja with a blunt charge to senior officers: confront internal weaknesses or risk undermining the institution’s credibility.
Held in Abuja, the conference focused on reflecting, reviewing and setting strategic priorities under the theme, “Building Future Partnerships: Lessons from the Customs-PACT Conference.”
Declaring the event open, Comptroller-General of Customs, Adewale Adeniyi, said the Service must now bring the same discipline and coordination that powered the successful Customs Partnership for African Cooperation in Trade (C-PACT) Summit into its internal operations.
He reminded officers that just a day earlier, the Service hosted a landmark continental event that drew customs chiefs, private-sector leaders and representatives from all African regions to Abuja.
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But Adeniyi warned that external achievements mean little without internal reforms. “You can’t sustain external credibility without internal integrity,” he said. “Turn the mirror inward and force honest discussions about what is working, what is failing and what must change.”
Speaking on the conference theme, he emphasised that the goal was to distil the principles behind the C-PACT Summit’s success, coordination, unified messaging and disciplined execution, and embed them permanently in the Service’s culture.
He recalled that preparations for the summit involved 16 straight weeks of coordination meetings, strict alignment with AfCFTA, and rapid conflict resolution because “failure was not an option with the world watching.”
The two-day conference will feature panel sessions, challenging presentations and open conversations designed to prioritise ideas over hierarchy and strengthen institutional discipline across the Service.
