How Customs Is Raising The Stakes In Management of Government Warehouses

BY EGUONO ODJEGBA

The Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, Government Warehouses that once upon a time was no more than an eyesore, and cuts the image of a refuse ground is wearing a new look with improved utilization of space driven by focused management.

 Perhaps, the greatest economic benefits arising from this is the finesse with which seized items are kept with a huge sense of record keeping, inventory and improved audit system that promotes accountability and corporate governance.

Above development findings show has greatly reduced the hitherto atmosphere of confusion, indiscriminate dumping, lax administrative outlook and a storage system lacking in proper control and promoting economic wastages.

All storage facilities, open and closed that makes up government warehouses under the service, whether at area command level or at the level of federal operations unit, the improved state of administrative control and higher sense of orderliness is evident.

From the Ikeja to Seme, Idiroko to Ibadan, Benin City, Owerri, Port Harcourt,Calabar, Ilorin, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Sokoto, the story is same, there is a serene atmosphere of how seizures are segmented and stored; with a new culture of responsible accounting system.

Given the new outlook in government warehouses, one cannot but applaud the leadership of the Nigeria Customs Service, for his innovative posture and determined stride to achieve improved efficiency via the retooling of human and material resources.

It is noteworthy that under the revitalized e-auction platform, the NCS has so far generated over N1.34 billion, while at the same time ending the hitherto regime of economic wastages occasioned by the hitherto poor culture of storage of seizures which were unattended to for many years, resulting in the systemic decay and devaluation of seized items.

Speaking with the Customs National Public Relations Officer, Abdullahi Maiwada  on the development, he attributed the improved performance to system overhaul, which formed the major plank of the new work culture introduced by the Comptroller  General of Customs, Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, at inception.

He explained that the CGC came with the mandate to decongest the port, and in doing so, logically carried out a comprehensive overhaul that is also manifest in the improved administration of storages and government warehouses.

“Number one, the CGC came with a mandate to decongest the port. Over the years there were containers hanging in the ports, occupying economic space for years and this translated into the creation of a committee which has other agencies of government represented on how to go about the decongestion of the port. Bear in mind that when you build more economic space the terminal operators will have enough space to stack more containers.

“That led to a proper deployment of the provision of the NCS Act on the disposal of seized and overtime goods. Secondly the service created a new platform for electronic auction which gave room for a kind of level playing ground for all Nigerians to participate in the auction provided they meet the requirements, which is that they must be Nigerians, show evidence of tax payments, have their TIN numbers and are eligible to partake’, Maiwada explained.

“When we started, the demand was just FIRS number but later after a meeting with the Joint Tax Board, TIN numbers from states inland revenue services  was also activated to benefit from the e-auction. So, that also led to the overhaul of the administration of seized items and the warehouses which involved the process of examination, condemnation, lodging, photo evidence, display of goods for auction all contributed to the improvement of revenue generated from seized and over timed goods”, he added.