New Telegraph

Freight forwarders snub council over poor regulatory role

LOW

Council’s performance below 40 per cent in 2021

 

Freight forwarders have said that there is no justification to pay the Practitioners Operating Fee (POF) to Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) because of its poor regulatory role at the seaports. According to them, the council has no excuse not to perform despite the N2.8 billion budget allocated to it in 2021.

 

Besides, they alleged that CRFFN collected N500 million from POF between July and November, 2021, noting that some freight forwarders had vowed not to pay the fee, which they described as a fraud. In 2021, the Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, had directed that the fee be collected through terminal operators for ease.

 

Despite that, some freight forwarders claimed that CRFFN had not made any impact in the industry, which would warrant it to collect any fee.

Speaking on its poor statutory roles, especially in training of freight forwarders, a leader of Africa Association of Professional Freight Forwarders and Logistics (APFFLON), Tincan chapter, Mr Godfrey Nwosu, noted that apart from the N2.8 billion budget allocated to the council in 2021, it made N500 million between when the collection commenced and November 2021.

 

He stressed that CRFFN did not perform up to 40 per cent in 2021, owing to the calibre of the persons occupying the council’s governing seat.

Nwosu alleged that members of the governing council did not make any legislation in the industry until the expiration of their term, which he said was a failure.

He said: “We are all aware of the budgetary allocations to the council, unless it comes out to tell us that the money allocated to it was not disbursed. “As at last year, N2.8 billion was allocated to the council.

They should defend it; ICPC invited the registrar last year and the outcome of the invitation we don’t know up till now. They claimed that they have offices in Abuja, Calabar but no such structures exist.

As at the last time I checked, POF has hit close to N500 million by November last year and imagine if everybody pays.” Meanwhile, the Registrar of CRFFN, Samuel Nwakohu, has said that the annual projection of the council is N5 billion yearly, saying that presently the council was collecting bellow N2 million per day.

He said: “Compliance is still very low. If you look at the projection that we have, it is about N5 billion a year and presently on the average, we get less than N2 million daily.

“It is going to be tough. But I believe that the more the terminal operators begin to enforce, the better. “The fact with the terminal operators is that when they all start enforcing, the level of compliance will go up considerably, because right now, it is less than five per cent.

“We have achieved less than five per cent of our projected revenue, which is poor. But the good thing is that we have started.”

It would be recalled that in January 2020, the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, gave the approval through the Director, Home Finance, Okokon Udo, to CRFFN that all cargoes exiting the port must pay N1,000 on every imported 20-feet container and 2,000 per 40-feet container.

The approval further stated that the receipt of payment of POF must be presented before cargoes exit the ports. The move was initiated to enable the council achieve its mandate of revenue collection.

Prior to this development, there had been disagreement among customs agents, freight forwarders and the council over payment of Professional Operating Fee (OPS) in the port industry.

Read Previous

Anchor Borrowers’ Progrmme key to forex conservation

Read Next

Ondo spare parts market in turmoil over royal interference in leadership tussle

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *