The Lillypond export command of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has said that the process and procedures for exporting goods out of the country is now a seamless exercise.
In an interaction with members of the Maritime Reporters Association of Nigeria (MARAN) at the International Press Centre, Apapa, on Thursday, Customs Area Controller of the Command, Comptroller Ajibola Odusanya, said that the feat was made possible following his dislodgement of criminal elements that had held the landlocked exports area down.
He said that his command can now process exports within a few hours, barring delays in accessing the Export Processing Terminal (EPT).
He lamented that such delays, especially at the Apapa Port are due to traffic gridlock on the internal port access road.
According to Odusanya, transferring the export containers to Apapa Port has become a challenge recently, as priority is placed on exiting import containers out of the port.
The Comptroller however assured that the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and APM Terminals are working assiduously to improve on the port internal traffic.
‘The NPA has contributed significantly to export facilitation by creating the Electronic Call-up System (ETO) and EPTs at the ports, but the internal port access roads would need more attention to clear up for seamless movement of export containers into the ports for outward shipping,’ Comptroller Odusanya said.
Odusanya recalled that, in 2022, the NCS and the NPA reached an agreement to make the Lilypond Port an export processing port as part of the country’s deliberate plans to improve exportation of non-oil products.
He noted that following the intervention and the presence of all the relevant agencies in the export port, processing of export goods have become very fast and seamless, leading to processing of about $2 billion worth of exports from the port between July and December 2024.
‘After the MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) between Customs and NPA to streamline export to Lilypond command in July 2024, the command became the only command processing sea bound export, we processed about $2 billion in that period between July and December, 2024.
‘In February 2025, we processed $225 million. This achievement is made possible by collaboration with other government agencies and port stakeholders.
‘We now have the DSS (Department of State Security), NDLEA (Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency), the Standards Organisation of Nigeria, and the quarantine service dedicated to export at Lilypond Port.
‘Now, as a result of the synergy with these sister agencies, export goods treated at Lilypond Command are not stopped by any other agency on its way to Apapa or Tincan port. Such export will only be checked by Lilypond Customs officers at the port gate and not necessarily to open the container, except there is a security alert’, he said.
He further noted that the NPA and the terminal operators would not allow the ugly port access road situation in Apapa in the past to return.
‘If you go to Lilypond now you will see many containers there, but the problem is not with processing of the exports in Lilypond, but the logistics aspect of moving the containers to the ports.
‘Sometimes, even when you have obtained your ETO, you won’t be able to access the port. You see the trucks lined up on the road with export containers on them. We have to work on this so that we don’t return to what it was before.
‘We have to keep working hard to maintain the sanity on the port road’, Odusanya emphasised.
