The Area Comptroller of the Tin-Can Island command of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Comptroller Dera Nnadi has assured importers’ and clearing agents operating in his area of jurisdiction that his team would optimise service delivery and facilitate trade in order to cushion recent hike in foreign exchange.
The assurance came against the background of Thursday’s upward adjustment of the exchange rate for the calculation of customs duty payment, by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Findings by our correspondent revealed that the adjustment of the exchange rate for the calculation of customs duty from N783. 174 per United States dollar to N952.941/$ appeared on the Customs and CBN portals on Thursday morning.
The development had set importers’ and clearing agents into a quandary with fears of an astronomical rise in the cost of clearing cargoes at the nation’s seaports.
At the silver jubilee celebration of the League of Maritime Editors held in Lagos on Thursday, Nnadi however assured the Importers and freight forwarders that the command would improve on its trade facilitation acts in order to mitigate the situation.
According to him, such mitigation would include deliberate efforts to facilitate trade where there were expected delays in customs processes, thereby making up on the impacts of the sudden increase in exchange rate.
“We will try and facilitate trade so that whatever little thing you would have paid as demurrage can be used to make up for this, and that’s the one I can manage.
“The other ones, (hike in exchange rate) the Nigeria Customs Service cannot manage it because it’s a function of the the federal government’s directive”, he assured.
The Area Controller explained that the NCS was equally jolted by the development, just like other stakeholders who were thrown into a dilemma by the development, but maintained that as an agency of government, the job had to be done, nonetheless.
He further said: “There’s no supermarket where they sell customs’ bread, all of us buy from the same place. Everything that happens to the economy affects customs officers too. And for your information, I am sure you have contacts or friends who relate with you, I have seen the National Vice President of ANLCA (Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents) here. I am sure your members may have called you.
“Just before I came here, I addressed the issue (at my office). We woke up this morning; remember I used the word ‘we’, that tells you that the Nigeria Customs.. We woke up this morning and found out that the exchange rate, which is the yardstick for collection of customs duty, which, before June/July, was N420 per dollar…. By July, it jumped to N775 per dollar, shortly after, it jumped to N778 per dollar. This morning, it increased to N951.94.
“We understand the implications of this to trade, bearing in mind that letters of credit had been opened, contracts had been signed, supply requirements had been made, people had negotiated business transactions and decisions on business had been taken based on the existing exchange rate. And so, we recognise the impact of this exchange rate adjustment especially when it is done without a prior notice on trade.
“Before I came here…, I addressed freight forwarders in Tincan Island Port this morning. It was part of the reason I came in late (for this event). I had to address freight forwarders this morning and I asked my Secretary to prepare a press statement for me and told him what to write that I will give to the media. It is good that I am here now.
“We recognise what the Nigerian business community is going through now, but there is little we can do about fiscal and monetary policies; our role is to implement them. We didn’t make them up but we align ourselves with government policies.
“Every government decision taken is for the collective interest of the nation and I expect that we must all abide by it.
“What I expect that we should do as customs now, which I told the freight forwarders and the clearing agents this morning is that, we will mitigate the impact of what they are going to go through in the next few days because of this, we are aware that having charged their clients, that is, the importers, what it will cost them to clear these goods, and then, with this sudden increase in exchange rate, if they go back to those importers, the importers may find it difficult to raise the money to give to them to make up. In the course of that, there may be delays and demurrage will be incurred on those cargoes.
“So, on my own part as customs, what I told the clearing agents this morning, before I came here was that, we will optimize our service delivery”.
The Area Comptroller said that Nigerians should understand “that most of our trade activities are highly subsidised. There are no two ways about it. I served in Seme (border), and I know that every morning, it was very easy for people from Benin Republic to trek into Nigeria to buy items and go back. That does not mean that one will support that there should be an increase in our tariff regimes and rates all the time. But I also expect that Nigerians should be patriotic enough to obey government policies when they are issued because every government policy is always issued in the best interest of the nation”.
On the apprehension that the development might fuel smuggling of goods into the country, Nnadi said: “Of course, for every Customs officer, not just in Nigeria but globally, one of our greatest challenges is trying to manage trade facilitation with issues of compliance. It’s very difficult but then, that’s why we are in the port, that’s why we are Customs officers.
“The issue of 43 items that were denied access to foreign exchange threw up so many challenges in the system, and we tried to address it and we did addressed it. So, if this one also drops another challenge, the same way we addressed the other one, we will also address this. So, don’t be discouraged”.
