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•Shippers’ Council, Customs low on performance, transparency, compliance
By Steve Agbota, [email protected] 08033302331
The recent report released by the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC) has shown that the ease of doing business has hit rock bottom rating in Nigeria’s seaports, as all the maritime agencies failed in overall Executive Order 1 (EO1) performance results.
It was sadden to note that only one of the maritime agencies, Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) was among top 10 in overall Executive Order 1 (EO1) performance results released in the PEBEC latest report.
PEBEC was established in July 2016 by President Muhammadu Buhari, to remove bureaucratic constraints to doing business in Nigeria and make the country a progressively easier place to start and grow a business.
The Executive Order 001 (EO1) on the Promotion of Transparency and Efficiency in the Business Environment issued on May 18, 2017, gives full executive support for reforms intended to foster an environment that is conducive for business by entrenching policies and practices that encourage transparency and efficiency in public service delivery.
The Nigerian importers have continued to pay dearly in cost due to the failure of agencies of government to effectively implement the Executive Order on Ease of Doing Business signed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, then acting President in 2017.
Part of Osinbajo’s directive then that agencies at the port should harmonise their operations into a single interface station at the port and implement single joint task force while the Apapa port to resume 24-hour operations within 30 days of the issuance of the Order among others.
About five years after Osinbajo gave the directive, none of the directive has been implemented or put in place as the nation’s port still being run between 8am to 5pm from Monday to Friday while there is no operation on Saturdays and Sundays at the port. The development shippers described as economic loss to the nation.
However, overall EO1 performance results for January 2022-December 2022, PEBEC ranks NIgerian Content Development Management Board (NCDMB) number one in over EO1 performance index. Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON) ranked number 2, Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commissions (FCCPC) ranked number 3, Nigerian Export-Import Bank (NEXIM) ranked number 4, Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) ranked number 5, Oil and Gas Free Zone Authority (OGFZA) ranked 6, Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) ranked 7, Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) ranked 8, Nigerian Electricity Management Services Agency (NEMSA) ranked 9 while Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) ranked 10 respectively. Meanwhile, the Nigerian Maritime Administration And Safety Agency (NIMASA) ranked 12, Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) ranked 29 while Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) ranked 30 out of 36 in the overall EO1 performance results.
In E01 performance results January 2021-December 22 on efficiency and transparency, only NIMASA was ranked among the top 10, which occupied 7th position while NPA ranked 12, Shippers Council ranked 23 and Customs ranked 28 respectively.
In the efficiency compliance ranking, NPA ranked 7th position in top 10 while NIMASA ranked 12, Shippers Council ranked 27 and Customs ranked 31 out of 36 MDAs.
In the area of transparency assessment ranking, NIMASA ranked 5th position in top 10 while NPA ranked 17, Shippers Council ranked 24 and Customs ranked 32 out of 36 MDAs.
Stakeholders who spoke with Daily Sun on the report, chided Nigerian Shippers’s Council for not making top 10 in any of the major ranking index on performance, transparency and compliance despite being the driver of the Ports Standing Task Team (PSTT) in collaboration with the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) and others, which their purpose is to entrench accountability and transparency, boost enforcement activities, as well as promote integrity in Nigeria’s maritime sector.
The stakeholders said that they don’t expect Customs to do well because the man who is the Comptroller General of the Service does not know anything about Customs, saying what the man is doing is unCustoms.
The stakeholders berated Shippers’ Council and Customs for performing woefully in the latest PEBEC report.
Speaking with Daily Sun, an importer, Mr Nurudeen Balogun, said since the Executive Order was signed in 2017, the Federal Government have not done enough to make 24-hour port operations possible, adding that 24-hour port operations remain far from reality even as he blamed the government’s lack of political will.
He said that insecurity, poor lighting infrastructure, thuggery and a host of factors continue to impede the port’s competitiveness in West Africa.
“So I’m not surprised that the maritime agencies did not do well in the report released by PEBEC. Some of these agencies need to be merged together so that they can function very well. For instance, government can merge NIWA and NIMASA together and Shippers Council and NPA together. Some of these agencies are docile. They don’t know what they are doing. The industry needs to be overhauled,” he added.
Meanwhile, President, National Council of Managing Directors of Licensed Customs Agents (NCMDLCA), Lucky Amiwero said in port, the law are not follow, there is no economic regulator, saying the nation’s port system is not transparent, consistent and predictable.
“So when you say ease of doing business, it has three layers, which is predictability, consistency and transparency. These are the three components you have and Nigerian port doesn’t have them. Whether you called other agency, there is no where you can talk about it because what you are talking about is transparency, which has to do with legal, your information and all the rest.
“Consistency is when you are sure your consignments go to the port and you move it out. When you are talking about ease of doing business, Nigerian port all over the place is not in compliance. Whether Customs, SON and all of them, they are just doing what they fell like. So ease of doing business. If any one of them come out and say they are complying, they might be telling lies,” he said.
Accord to him, Nigeria runs one of the most uncoordinated ports in the whole world, saying nobody controls the port and there is no leading agency in the port.
“People work the way they like. At the cost of the importers, we have a very expensive port runs without any lead agency. We don’t comply with laws, Customs, terminal operators and shipping companies do what they feel like. So you find out that some consignments are in the port for years.
“When you say ease it means how to do business with seamless operations and we don’t have it in the Nigerian port. The agency that supposed to reduce the bottlenecks in the port is not doing anything after eight years and the bottlenecks are still there. The port is even getting worst than they way they met it.
Eight years is most gone and the port is in sorry state,” he complained.
On why Customs scored so low on the PEBEC report, he said Customs is not controlled by the Ministry, saying many of the things they do, they do it on their own and they don’t comply with laws.
“Look at Customs, they are having so many units. They have Strike force, FOU, Valuation, and TIU. What they are doing is unCustoms. When the new government comes, they have to look at those areas. Customs are not doing their job. What they are doing is enforcement. Enforcement in their job is 10 per cent while the rest is trade procedure, which is processing and procedure. But they don’t comply with the procedure.
He said Shippers’ Council does not have business in the port, but during Goodluck Jonathan’s regime, they were given port economic regulator, since then, they were unable to do anything.
“Shippers council is not doing anything. Customs is doing things contradicting law. They brought retired Colonel as Comptroller General to come and reform Customs, what can he reform? A man that doesn’t have Customs knowledge, how can he reform Customs?
“A retired colonel in Military is an assistant Comptroller in Customs. The man in Customs is more knowledgeable than the man in Military. How can you bring a colonel that doesn’t know anything about the Customs and you expect something better? You can’t expect anything better from such a man! This government messed up a lot of things in this country,” he explained.
