ANLCA Urge PBAT To Name Specific Items Listed In Import Duty Suspension

…Wants Tokunbo Vehicle’s Levy Removed

BY FUNMI ALUKO

To remove all doubts and confer integrity and a sense of believability on the removal of customs duty on imported foods as announced by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) has appealed to the presidency to list the affected food items.
The request becomes necessary, according to ANLCA, following the air of confusion that has pervaded the presidential directive, especially based on findings that the implementing authority, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), have reportedly said it is not aware of the development, since it is yet to receive a memo to that effect.

Speaking on the development, ANLCA Vice President, Prince Segun Oduntan said that whereas the association is not in support of the plan hunger protest in Nigeria, he said the decision of the presidency to douse the anger of the populace by granting tax holiday on duties payable on imported foods should be properly documented for ease of enforcement and implementation.
“ANLCA is not in support of any violent protest that would bring anarchy into the country. For those who want to go on their protest, they should let it be peaceful, we as ANLCA are not part of any protest.

“However, from our professional side, we want to let the government know that things are not going well and we want to present a 3-point agenda to President Bola Tinubu.

“The first is the instability in the foreign exchange for cargo importation which has affected our business, we have made noise about it severally, we made several presentations to different hierarchy of government. We argued that government should create a window of certain period, let’s say three months, and benchmark the foreign exchange at a particular amount, so that importers can plan their importation while opening their Form M.
“The fluctuating exchange rate is the major cause of the inflation in the market which has led to the hardship Nigerians are going through today, importers cannot plan their importation and the blame goes to the government.
If this can be handled, the inflation in the country would be reduced. No economy will survive with foreign exchange instability.
“Second agenda is the waiver of import duty on specific food items, especially staple foods. Although we are hearing in the media that government has signed removal of duty on food items, we want government to come out in clear terms, because currently, if you go to the customs, they would tell you that there is no circular to that effect, there is no documented directive from the Federal Government for them to implement.
“Government pronouncements are not implementable without a hardcopy circular to the implementing agencies.The Federal Ministry of Finance should do the needful by directing customs to implement the waiver of import duties on food items and we want it in hardcopy”, the ANLCA second-in-command said.
The group also asked that government should revisit the issue of levy on imported second hand vehicles to provide a lease of affordable logistics in the movement of both agricultural and manufacture products.
“The third point agenda is the removal of levy and import duty on used vehicles. The levy being collected on imported used vehicles should be removed so that people can at least move their farm products and buy food at cheaper rates. This would further boost the agricultural sector.
Oduntan dismissed arguments that the removal of customs duty on specific imported foods will make such imports unattractive.

“I believe it would have a far reaching impact. We are talking about staple food items, not all foods, it could be for specific period of time, just to cushion the effect of the hunger in the land.
For example, the lack of employment into some of these government security and Paramilitary agencies is what is affecting the agencies today. The window of importation of the specific food items we are talking about is not going to be permanent, it is for a specific period.
“We are talking about crisis management, a situation akin to a force majure usually declared at the offshore sector, people are hungry in the land, and you have to treat them diligently , you have to bend double backwards to deal with the mass hunger”, he enthused.
On the worries of the shutdown of the nation’s seaports and it’s effects on the national economy and wellbeing of the citizenry, Prince Oduntan note that despite not participating in the protest, the idea of the protest at all and those to carry it out will have a retroactive effects of productivity.
“We don’t need to visit the port before carrying out our work, I can pay my customs duty from the corridors of my home, I can do majority of my transactions including payment of shipping companies and terminal operators online, right from my house. If you don’t have any business to do at the port, there is no point coming to the port to loiter around, however, if you have a job to do, you can go about your job.
He appealed to the federal government to climb down from its high horse and begin to engage purposefully with the critical stakeholders and avoid the ‘government knows it all attitude; lamenting that despite being central to the collection of customs revenue, government has failed to engage meaningfully with ANLCA and the customs brokerage community.
“However, you and I know that the banks who are the major player in duty collection would not be open from tomorrow. The cargo haulage is the only challenge at this time because this has to do with movement by road.
“We are appealing to President Tinubu to call stakeholders from different spheres of the economy, he should have a roundtable meeting with them and set up a committee. There is a lot of government appointees in this present government who do not know their job, they are not informing the President correctly, they are not round pegs, everyone is doing eye-service to the President, meanwhile they do not know their job.
“It is high time Mr President look inwards and carryout a review, let there be interaction with the stakeholders in order to get firsthand information and be able to treat the situation. The President is doing his best, he has proven himself to be a listening President, if there is any development in the country, within 24 hours, you will see his reaction, but there is a lot of appointees in his government who are not performing and are not supposed to be there.
“There is need for the government to look at what the maritime sector is generating into the nation economy. The customs service today is taking trillions from various port commands, but who are the people running around to generate these monies? It is we the foremost licensed agents, yet when the government is setting up any committee, they don’t including us there, and you think we are happy.
“The Ease of Doing Business Committee, ANLCA was formerly represented on that seat by our current national President who was the Vice president then, but this is no longer the same, everything has been rubbished. Even the bankers do recognise their depositors and they sometimes give them awards, but we as licensed customs agents are not getting the right encouragement from the customs service.