“80% Of Cargoes Coming Into Nigeria Are Under-declared”-----Shippers’ Council Boss

The Shippers’ Council boss, Barrister Hassan Bello

The Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) has raised alarm that about 80 percent of cargoes imported into Nigeria are being under-declared thereby leading to loss of revenue for government and delay in the cargo clearance process.

The Council has assured however that the anomalies witnessed in the clearance of cargo will henceforth be eliminated as the Council is set to commence the implementation of the Cargo Tracking Note (CTN)

The Shippers’ Council boss, Barrister Hassan Bello stated this at the closing of a 2-day training programme for journalists tagged 'A New Port Order : A ?New Maritime Media'.

Bello assured that the Cargo Tracking Note will reduce under-declaration of cargoes by Nigerian shippers because the Council would have got information on what is inside a container even before the vessel sets sail for Nigeria. He added that all Bill of Laden will no longer read "said to contain".

According to him, the CTN will also help the federal government to identify dangerous goods coming into Nigeria and immediately this is observed by Shippers Council, an alert will be issued to the security agencies and the Nigeria Customs Service.

He assured that when the CTN comes on stream, cargoes will no longer come into Nigeria without the Nigerian Shippers Council giving the vessel permission to sail in after having all information like the Gross Tonnage of the ship? among others.

"Our emphasis is on trade information and also, it will help us in clearance, the most important of this is that 80% of goods coming into Nigeria are under-declared, every importer always wants to cut corners and cheat the government"

"For example, you import furniture but you said it is not furniture but walking sticks, almost all the importers under-declare and this leads to loss of revenue for the government, it also leads to delay and that is why Customs sometimes insist on inspecting based on physical examination" he said.

Bello expressed happiness at the fact that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is equally excited about the CTN and it is on the same page with the Shippers Council on the exercise.

Apart from being a totally paperless exercise, the Shippers Council boss assured that CTN is not going to add to the cost of doing business in Nigeria. He assured that the Shipper will not pay any charge for the CTN, neither will the government?, noting that the former CTN as operated by NPA was based on revenue collection.

According to him, the information on the cargoes, will be shared with the Nigeria Customs Service in order to enable them prepare and to pass cargoes out of the port faster.

He also said that shipping companies will no longer delay a cargo unnecessarily, because they would have had clear and prior information on what a container is loaded with.

"The CTN that was introduced two years back was an aberration, the NPA has no business running the CTN. All over the world it is the Shippers Council that operates CTN because it deals with tracking cargoes, so when it was given to NPA we became a laughing stock because that time we were not very strong", he added.

He said that the last CTN had no sufficient stakeholders’ consultation, but that today the council is already collating points from stakeholders which will be included in the agreement.http://shippingposition.com.ng/article/%E2%80%9C80-cargoes-coming-nigeria-are-under-declared%E2%80%9D-shippers%E2%80%99-council-boss