• How command broke revenue collection record, hit over N1trillion before fiscal year end • Lists landmark seizures •Pledges to sustain feat in years ahead
By Steve Agbota
Comptroller Dera Nnadi is the Customs Area Controller of the Tin Can Island Port Command, Lagos.
He is barely a year old in the command as Comptroller, but his achievements under the short period are quite overwhelming.
For many years, the Tin Can Island has not witnessed a facelift, but today, Mr Nnadi has returned it to its past and lost glory that many stakeholders have applauded.
Besides, he has led his men to set a new record of revenue collection for the command, shooting over his annual target before the end of the fiscal year.
In this exclusive interview with Sunday Sun, he gave details on how the command generated over N1 trillion revenue in 10 months, the huge seizures made in the port, which include arms and ammunition, as well as illicit drugs: cocaine, Canadian Loud, Cannabis indica, Codeine and other dangerous unregistered pharmaceuticals.
Nnadi hinged his achievements on the various innovations the management of the Nigeria Customs Service, headed by Comptroller General Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, has introduced to boost trade facilitation in the ports and land borders.
He said through the innovations, the Tin Can Island Command was able to hit over N1 trillion revenue, which he described the highest in the history of the Command.
He also spoke about how he and his officers have been able to tackle smuggling activities at the Port and other issues relating to the activities of the Command.
It is slightly over one year that you came to the Tin Can Island Port. What was the port you met upon assumption of duty last year?
I resumed duty at Tin Can exactly on September 16, 2023. I met a very dynamic environment, a trade environment, a multifunctional command, where Customs activities ranging from RORO operation to container operation to bulk cargo, both liquid and solid bulk cargo delivery take place. I also met a port where transire operations take place. Cargo is transferred to bonded terminals outside the port in order to decongest the port. And, of course, I met a port that was highly committed to fast track delivery of cargo to owners’ premises, after which Customs go to clear the cargo. However, we met a port environment where our revenue target was at 42 per cent, and, therefore, we needed just three months and a half to collect 52 per cent. That’s what we met on ground, but to the glory of God, by the end of December 31, 2023, we were able to hit 98 per cent of our allotted target. I give that feat to the commitment of the Customs officers.
I also give the feat to innovations that were put in place, and perhaps to the little upsurge we had towards the ember months. And, therefore, it became a yardstick for us to measure our performance in the coming year, 2024. This is like a brief of what we met on ground and how we took it from the end of 2023.
How has the one year at Tin Can Port been, we learnt you have hit over N1trillion revenue collection, the highest in the history of Tin Can, even when the fiscal year has not ended? How did you achieve this feat?
Like I said, the year 2023 ended with a very optimistic note. Our officers found out that they can actually make it in terms of our key performance indicator as it concerns revenue generation. Therefore, we leveraged on the lessons we learned in 2023. The first thing we did was to declare the year 2024 as the year of stakeholders. The idea was to have the buy-in of the stakeholders. I recall that following the devaluation of Naira, and following the Naira crisis, and then rising from 2023, that was a year of transition, being the year that there was an election and then a handover from one government to the other. President Mohammadu Buhari handed over to President Bola Tinubu.
And besides that transition at federal level, there was also a transition within Customs, where we had a new Comptroller General. So, what happened was that the expectations, the delays that initially led to the lull in revenue generation in the first and second quarter of 2023 was removed after the government has been sworn in. Again, the expectations of the people towards a new year and a new rollout of government policy for 2024 was now doused. When government announced new economic policies, ministers were appointed and people set to work. All these added to the impetus that made us get more attention to our operations. That is, the stakeholders being promised that 2024 was their year in Tin Can, government policy being rolled out after much lull following the transition, both at federal level and at Customs level. But above all, we discovered that the new Comptroller General that just came on board rolled out three policy trusts, which was collaboration with our old and new stakeholders, consolidation on the gains made by the past Customs regime, and, of course, innovations. I think the main thing that helped us to generate this revenue are the innovations that we have introduced. And what are those innovations? First, we reassured the international trading community that we are ready for business and that the sole of business is a quality and timely delivery of their cargo to their warehouses and to their premises. And, therefore, we started quite early the time release study. We introduced the advanced ruling and then the authorized economic operators programme. These are globally-accepted tools that help to facilitate trade and make any port environment competitive. So these coupled with the fact that we declared 2024 the year of stakeholders, coupled with the fact that we started training officers, building their capacity in terms of recent developments and in line with the dynamism of the industry, we had the buy-in of the stakeholders. But one of the things that we also noticed is that there was some element of voluntary compliance by the traders. So, those who hitherto didn’t want to pay duties had confidence in our ability, particularly after they noticed that the port access road, which hitherto had been blocked for over 13 years, was cleared.
It shows them that the present people at the port, in Tin Can here, are committed to their welfare, to the growth of their business, and to their comfort. And, of course, to creating an environment for trade to thrive competitively, both across other ports in Nigeria and within the subregion. I think all these grew investors’ confidence, traders’ confidence, stakeholders’ confidence in the port.
It is the accumulation of all these, first, that led to the increased revenue that we have seen. But the next one is the commitment of the officers themselves. I try to motivate the officers.
Sometimes you cajole, sometimes you plead, but the most important thing is that we provide an enabling environment for them to operate. And, therefore, officers giving their best. I cannot forget also to mention that our stakeholders from other governments also contributed. But besides that, we also had headquarters on our toes. They were always encouraging. Sometimes they call to remind you of the obligations you owe the service. Sometimes they harass you and I must use that word to live up to what you are supposed to do. Sometimes they encourage you, they motivate you. Several officers of this command received awards. I gave some personal awards to my officers. We also received commendations from headquarters. We received commendations from the zonal coordinator. These are motivating factors that helped officers to achieve this feat that we have. But I must say one thing, too. We also noticed that cargo throughput dropped. As at last year, 2023, there was more cargo compared to this year, 2024, by this time, we have less cargo. To the extent that cargo throughput dropped by almost 40-something per cent, if not more. Yet, we achieved this. But the question then is, what happened? A combination of everything I told you now, and then, of course, the devaluation of the currency also helped. Because exchange rate increased, and therefore, we collected based on the new exchange rate. Detractors will tell you that this is the only thing that helped, but it’s not true. Because if you compare the cargo throughput for 2023, and then compare with the cargo throughput for 2024, you will see that it is less in 2024. Therefore, the revenue collected from less duty is actually an indication of some hard work and application of these tools that I mentioned to you. And, of course, as you know, towards the later part of this year, the talk of Customs rejigging their procedure through the B-Odugwu platform is also something that gave impetus to the traders, knowing that as an indigenous platform, that issues that are head to cause delays in our server system will be addressed. Nothing drives trade, nothing grows revenue like confidence in your process. I think these are some of the things that helped to increase our revenue, as you asked.
Again, we noticed that Tin Can is now wearing a new-look right from the entrance, whst did you do?
Like I said earlier, Comptroller General of Customs introduced three policies trusts, one of it is innovation. We discovered that much as we are improving the capacity of officers and stakeholders, much as we improved the port access roads, we introduced the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO), Time Release Study, the Advanced Ruling and then we introduced the B-Odogwu, which is a local variant of what we used to do with Web Fountaine under the the NICIS, Nigerian Customs Information System.
We felt that we need to complement all these with an office environment that will look corporate and instill commitment in officers who needed to create a corporate image in this environment. And, therefore, we noticed that this building has not been renovated for over 40 years. There has not been any renovation of this building for over 40 years. So, we wrote to the Nigerian Ports Authority to seek their approval to come and renovate the building. But they gave us their approval to do the renovation, and we contacted the Comptroller General Customs, who sent in support for us to do this, and gave us the needed logistics for this. And this is what you’ve seen.
Besides the physical and aesthetics that you’ve seen, we also noticed that the sewage of this building, since inception, has never been attended to. The groundwater waste cannot seep out. The compound used to be overtly flooded. So, it took a very big job for us. The newlook, you see, is exciting to me, to the officers, and to our stakeholders. And indeed, I expect it should be so for every well-meaning Nigerian. What we are now battling with is how to maintain this. And, therefore, we are appealing to the stakeholders to put the facility into very good use, so that we don’t take it back to what it used to be. This is not the end of what we are doing here. We are still going to continue to improve on the environment, and maintain what we’ve so far achieved, while we encourage the stakeholders to support us in this aspiration. As we are also doing this, we are also worried and concerned that if we don’t sustain the gains we’ve made, particularly on the Port access road, the environmental pollution occasioned by the waste that was dumped on this road, that we may go back to those olden days. And that is where I would give commendation to The Sun Newspapers for the role it played in creating awareness for this Port access road, when there was this 13 years gridlock on it, when people used to dump their wastes on the road. We also want to use this opportunity to appeal to The Sun, and indeed every media house in Nigeria, to create awareness around the upgrading of this Customs building and its environment, including the Port access road, that people should learn to respect their environment, people should learn to add value to their environment for the good of all.
Sir, can we know your experience with smugglers, illegal hard drug dealers and other importers who try to manoeuvre the Customs to cut corners, we know you had made huge seizures at Tin Can even when you were at Seme and Ogun State. How has it been?
Thank you very much! For me, national security is one of the priorities for the Nigerian Customs Service. When we talk about national security here, people tend to think it’s just about seizing goods, no! Our revenue collection effort is also a contribution to national security, because through our efforts in promoting trade, we create employment, we create opportunities for industries to thrive. And by doing that, we help government in fighting unemployment, and as we fight unemployment, you remove restless people from the streets, you make them gainfully employed, and in doing that, you create atmosphere of security. But besides that, we are also worried about those that import illicit goods, those that smuggle, those that evade duty payment. These are all aspects of smuggling. You made reference to what I did in Idiroko and at Seme. Yes, it is our belief when I was in Idiroko and Seme that a secured border will translate to more revenue in the seaport. Because if we are able to secure the land borders from smugglers, most of them will divert their goods to the seaport, which is a better controlled environment for collection of tax. And, therefore, we took it upon ourselves, myself and my colleagues, when I was both at Idiroko and Seme, to ensure that we keep that government mantra and expectation that the ports should be properly secured.
I recall that while we were in Seme, we were not only tackling those that were smuggling imported or exported goods, we also tackled even those that were involved in currency trafficking. As you can recall, we seized in Seme six million fake US dollars, an equivalent to N2.7 billion sometime. And significantly too, there was something that somebody sent to me yesterday as breaking news. Some dead animals, birds that were seized in one of the ports in America. And I had to send him pictures and a story of dead birds and animals that were also seized in Seme, besides the petroleum products and the other items that were seized. But coming to the seaport, it became a new challenge. Just barely three months after we resumed here, we handed over the sum of 54,000 US dollars that was used as an inducement to officers of the command. And before my resumption here, my predecessor was being induced with that money. His officers refused to collect the money and we seized it.
We handed over that money to the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC). And shortly after that, we made seizure of some arms and some cannabis indica. But the icing on the cake was when the command, in a space of two weeks, seized three containers. Two bearing cocaine and one bearing heroine. That was a very landmark seizure considered that for a very long time, the port had never witnessed such. And then it brought back to me memories of when I was also Deputy Comptroller of Customs in charge of enforcement here. When we seized a whopping 19 containers of tramadol between 2017 and 2020. And when we also seized over 1,915 pieces of pump-action rifles in three containers in a space of two months. I think I should say that I’ve always been lucky. And if you define luck in terms of preparedness and knowledge in my interception of these illicit imports with assistance of my colleagues. And, of course, I’m sure you read recently too, that the command seized 16 containers of illicit drugs worth N37 billion in a single swoop. This is very significant and I want to congratulate the officers who made this possible. Those officers are not just Customs officers, but we have other sister agencies that collaborated with us and shared intelligence. Talking about National Drug Law Enforcement Agency and our foreign collaborators from His Royal Majesty’s Drug Enforcement Agency in UK to the Canadian Police and, of course, the US Drug Law Enforcement Agency. All these people have been collaborating with us including offering capacity building opportunities to us. I must commend the US Embassy, for instance. I also want to thank our officers and, of course, the CEO of Drug Law Enforcement Agency, Brigadier Abu Bamaru, who recognized the effort we’ve made here, gave us this award you are seeing here as a commendation for what we’ve done. I think the greatest appreciation should go to the Comptroller General of Customs. I mean Comptroller General of Customs, Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, who through his motivation and encouragement have given us a leeway to achieve most of the successes we’ve recorded. I think he has not had the last yet from Tin Can because we are still not resting on our laurels. We are putting modalities in place to ensure that more seizures, more arrests are made. And as you heard from NDLEA the last time we met, following our collaboration with them, 37 drug barons have been busted in Tin Can comprising, according to them, 33 males and four females. And 20 of them have been convicted. The beauty of this is that we’ve been able to add to the security architecture of the country because it is suspected following an interview with some of the people that were arrested that most of these drugs are shipped to aid, apart from those on transit. The majority of them like the Tramadol, the Codeine and the Cannabis are shipped to aid the insurgency in Nigeria as they are sold to the criminals.
In all of these seizures made, how has modern technology helped your Command, do you people have scanners to help your efforts?
Yes, it has helped a lot. In this era of artificial intelligence, in this era of geospatial intelligence, I wouldn’t say that we’ve deployed so much of artificial intelligence, but we have deployed geospatial intelligence effectively. It has helped.
We have also had the collaboration of our partner foreign agencies who share intelligence with us. But besides all, Customs now have a platform through our trade portal that helps us to access documents even before declarations are made. Most of the seizures we’ve made were done because using our systems we’ve been able to profile the movement of some cargo and we’ve been able to suspect some and most of the time they prove positive. I would say that the deployment of technology is something that we aspire. It’s a new thing coming up now, our blockchain technology which has been integrated into the B-Odugwu platform. So, I wouldn’t say we’ve deployed fully the use of technology, but I would say that with the launching of B-Odugwu, it will be a blast for us in the use of technology and ICT in a smuggler operation. And this also includes even border operation. I think those that will benefit most from this new innovation will be those at the border because a lot has been included through the B-Odugwu platform for this.
With all these checks in place, why are smugglers still unrelenting in illicit businesses?
The incentive for smuggling is always high all over the world. The gains made by smugglers is always high. As we heard from the Drug Law Enforcement Agency during our last press briefing, if a carton of Tramadol sells for N25 million , imagine if a container load of Tramadol contains 500 cartons. That translates into huge sums of money, close to N12 billion to N13 billion. That means the incentive to smuggle is always higher. Nothing motivates smuggling than the profit that comes out of it. However, we are not resting. We’ve been able to decimate some of the smugglers’ resources and we hope to continue.
How has the Comptroller General, Alhaji Bashir Adeniyi helped your Command to achieve these feats?
Okay! He created enabling environment for us through the robust stakeholders’ engagement. Recall when he took over newly, the first thing was to tour all sisters agencies, all other ministry department agencies that has something to do with business and international trade, including sister security agencies, the Nigerian Ports Authority and related agencies. What this means is that the collaboration, intelligence sharing, trade data sharing became more with us. Besides that, the officers also felt that after 80 years, they have somebody that grew through the ranking Customs to become their Comptroller General. They too got motivated with that. It became like an incentive for them. Besides that, he introduced the trade policies that I mentioned earlier, the collaboration, consolidation and innovation. These are motivating factors. But outside that, the advance ruling that he introduced, the authorized economic operator programme, the time-release study, and, of course, our participation in the African-Continental Free Trade Agreement with its attendant issues around origin and so on and so forth, are all examples of what motivated us to achieve some of the gains that we made. Besides that, as civil servants, we look forward to collecting our salaries. And I must say that you cannot take it for granted that salaries of officers are paid as at when due. Officers are being trained and encouraged. At the time, somebody said he has lost count of the number of training opportunities that have been offered to officers in various aspects of our operation. Our facilities are being improved. This is support, as you can see here. And they are building a new Customs village somewhere in Shagamu, in Ogun State. Existing infrastructure have been upgraded, and the new ones are coming up. Now, what this means is officers look forward to a robust engagement with their institution. And nothing is better than when people look forward to a better future. I think it’s one of the greatest incentives for man, that you feel that you have a secured future. And you don’t expect anything less than to giving back to the Comptroller General as word of saying thank you. I think that is one of the motivating things.
We have seen your achievement in one year, do you intend to keep it up in the years ahead?
Of course, every Customs officers is always reacting to the dynamism of the environment. Nobody says okay, I have reached the peak of my career, let me stop. Even in a retirement, you keep your service number. So, it is like you are on reserve and you can be called upon to assist, that is why if you are retired, nobody takes away your service number, it is still left with you, you keep it. I wouldn’t say I’m going to rest on my oars. Of course, I will continue and the most important is that we are grooming some set of officers who copied what we are doing. Most of the things you have seen we are doing here in this improvement of the environment were done by Customs officers. There is no contractor, Customs officers did it. It was a in-house thing. All the officers that are engineers here participated and we are able to achieve that. Those that developed B-Odugwu are young Customs officers and some have up to 20 to 25 more years to stay on the job. Those that seized the jobs we just announced are all Customs officers. So, it is not just about me, it is about the system. So, we have a system that is autopilot such that even if I’m not here and even if I’m here, we have officers that can still achieve the same feat we have already achieved. We have already hit N1 trillion and above, I don’t think we are going to go back because the same structure that was used to achieve is to going to be maintained, we are not going back. So, I believe we will continue on this trajectory and we will continue to improve.