By UCHE USIM

Come June 30, this year, the seven-year contract for the cargo Destination Inspection (DI) scheme currently operated by four service providers – Cotecna Destination Nigeria Limited, SGS, Global Scansystems and Web Fontaine, will officially expire.

DI is a service whereby goods and import declarations are inspected on arrival in the importing country and the scheme, from July 1, is expected to be run by the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) if the terms of the agreement is anything to go by.

The deal hitherto expired in December 2012 but was extended by six months, thus making July 1 the anticipated handover date.

The service providers, working in consonance with the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), are private sector companies, who installed cargo scanners in various seaports, airports and land borders and the interconnectivity of their operation is buoyed by an ICT platform provided by Web Fontaine.

One of the terms of the contract was the provision, operation and maintenance of the hi-tech scanners and to train Customs personnel in the same capacity before the expiration of the deal.

The handover brouhaha has become a hot subject of debate among stakeholders in the Maritime sector.

As it is in every debate, some believe the NCS is ready, willing and able to takeover the operations of the DI, while others feel otherwise, insisting that the NCS is only politically ready and not professionally prepared to run the show.

Some NCS officials, who confided in Daily Sun alleged that the service providers are fighting hard to sabotage their takeover of the scheme by July 1.

They explained that the scanning companies have created unpalatable circumstances that will naturally rob the service of the required capacity to takeover.

To address that, the NCS source said about 300 officers were flown out for training with Smith Detection in France, on the proper operations and maintenance of the scanning machines, being the same type used by DI service providers.

On the other hand, the service providers have equally alleged that the NCS officials are more interested to be on the field (‘where the action is’) than to stay at the training locations.

According to the Managing Director of Global Scansystems Limited, Fred Udechukwu, the development has left a serious knowledge gap in the Customs, especially in the area of operations and maintenance of the scanners.

Port users, who spoke with Daily Sun said the Customs is desperate to take over the DI scheme, while the service providers are reluctant to handover, as they are smiling to the banks on a daily basis.

They stressed that the attraction to the scheme by both parties is buoyed by the money each of them eyes to make and not necessarily striving to improve on the service delivery to consumers.

As the debate rages, experts in the industry say the takeover of the scheme should follow a transition process mid-wifed by a Transition Committee set-up by the Federal Government, the initiator of the DI Scheme.

The transition committee should comprise officials of the Finance Ministry (the mid-wife of DI) the Central Bank, Customs reform committee members and other stakeholders.

Experts also say a comprehensive audit of the entire scheme ought to be done to track the milestones the service providers have covered and ascertain whether they are operating within the dictates of the agreement.

Stakeholders also advise that government should, without bias, assess the capacity of the NCS to run the scheme before any form of handover, in the interest of the country.

A member of the Presidential Committee on Customs reforms, who pleaded anonymity, told Daily Sun in an interview that the agreement the Federal Government had with the service providers stated that on-the-job training of Customs personnel to be provided by them (service providers) for the eventual takeover of the DI ought to have started by November 11, 2011, and wrapped up by November 2012.

“The government has not brought this to being. The complete training, I mean on-the-job training has not taken place and that is part of the transition process. There ought and should be a transition committee comprising officials of the Finance Ministry, the CBN, the NCS and other stakeholders. The committee was part of our recommendation as Presidential Committee members. The DI Scheme is not a Customs initiative. It belongs to the Finance Ministry and the Customs is not the body that should be saying it is ready to take over the DI. The Federal Government should. The DI is a very complex programme. It’s technical. It involves scanners and other hi-tech equipment. If mismanaged, it could be harmful to the people living in the Nigeria. It can cause cancer. So, it’s not a political matter as some people are bandying it,” the source said.

However, the NCS via the Comptroller General, Dikko Inde Abdullahi last year, told the Senate Committee on Maritime and journalists in Abuja that Nigeria lost a whopping N90 billion to underpayment of Destination Inspection fee in 2012, which also represented 10 per cent of the total revenue collected in the year.

He noted that the quick passage of the Customs Exercise Management Act (CEMA) could stem the tide as it ensures the NCS becomes autonomous particularly in the area of destination inspection services.

At a tour of the NCS facilities at its Abuja headquarters, the Deputy Comptroller General of NCS, Garba Makarfi told Maritime journalists that as the systems of the service have been computerized and as such fully ready to take over DI in June once the government gives the nod.

“We are computerizing our system apart from ASYCUDA, we have the trade hub, we have the Pre-Arrival Assessment Report (PAAR) while we have the ruling centre. We have the ICT, all the connectivity where we connect to all the agencies. We are online as you are aware, you don’t need to have any physical contact with Customs officers before you clear your goods once you have done a honest transaction. It is also a system that targets the high risk consignment before arrival. This is to check for the likelihood of hazardous importations that could threaten environmental life and National security,” he said.

According to the NCS, PAAR was developed in 2012 as part of measures to respond adequately to the increasing volume of trade vis a vis the limited human and financial resources.

The ICT ruling centre has trained officers assuming the following roles: administrators of NCS-PAAR application scrutiny-officers; final document verification officers; valuation and classification Officers, and; risk profile Officers.

Besides, commercial banks are scheduled to work with their own system based rules.

Also speaking at the visit, Yusuf Bashar, Deputy Comptroller, Operations said the NCS would ensure conclusion of all customs clearing procedures in six hours, as soon as the Pre Arrival Assessment Report (PAAR) is implemented.

“The essence of PAAR is that it eliminates waiting for any document by the importers when his/her cargo arrives. As we are speaking today, PAAR is ready but June is the policy statement for PAAR to replace RAR when the inspection would be handed over to the customs. Customs will work round the clock. There are four shifts of six hours each. A building designated and known as Refreshment Centre has already been commissioned by the Comptroller-General of Customs, Abdullahi Dikko, for the use of officers of PAAR and Nigeria Trade Hub Centres,” he explained.

While the NCS is rejoicing over its ‘achievements’, the Managing Director of Global Scansystem Limited (one of the service providers), Fred Udechukwu, has expressed doubts over the competence of the NCS to possibly take over and operate the DI scheme from July 1.

In an interactive session with journalists, Udechukwu warned of possible outbreak of cancer if the cargo scanners installed at Nigerian airports, seaports and land borders are entrusted to those he described as untrained and inexperienced people after the exit of the service providers.

Udechukwu says the NCS lacks competent hands to operate and maintain the scanning machines.

The Global Scansystem boss also alleged that all the efforts by the service providers to train Customs personnel in this critical aspect of the contract were thwarted by the top echelon of the Service.

“For Global Scan, the contract stipulates that we should train 350 officers, but I insisted that that number is too negligible to make an impact. We have so far trained 1,600 officers and we are still training. However, the officers are not trainable in the operations and maintenance of scanner because of the dearth of officers with the requisite knowledge in engineering courses. Customs has no engineer!’’ he asserted.

According to him, few of the officers the service providers had found to be manageable and had trained were not allowed to stay for the mandatory period for supervision before they were redeployed by their superiors.

“Some of them are more interested to be on the field, where the action is, than to stay at the training sites,’’ Udechukwu alleged.

Warning of dire health consequences, if the scanners are left in the hands of Customs personnel after the exit of the service providers, Udechukwu said: “The fixed scanner emit nine million volts of x-ray, which is the maximum allowed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) while the mobile scanner emit 3.8 million volts of x-ray. But if it goes beyond that, anybody who is within the sight of the machine will die. The x-ray being emitted by these machines cause cancer and you could imagine if they are left in the hands of the untrained and uncommitted people, cancer will ravage this country, God forbid.’’

Udechukwu explained that it takes a minimum of between 12 months and 18 months to get adequate training on the operation and maintenance of these machines, with additional six months for supervision.

The Global Scansystem boss claimed that the service providers had to prevail on the Customs Management to recruit young physists, chemists in their first recruitment exercise, but lamented that none of these officers was sent to them for training after their mandatory training in Customs rudiments.

http://sunnewsonline.com/new/business/destination-inspection-between-customs-desperation-and-service-providers-reluctance/

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abbe7: On the first hand, I think the NCS have qualified officers to take up the DI scheme from the inspection agents, but may have issues in computing technicalities, operation and maintenance of the scanning machines. They (NCS) need recruit graduates with backgrounds in engineering and data/information management systems to function effectively in this area, and also to avoid constant machine break ups and delays in processing and assessing results from scanned containers as currently witnessed in the RUBBISH Ap Moller Terminals in Apapa Port. The worst terminal in Nigeria with a monopolistic reputation for causing demurrage, port congestion, and trade defacillitation. The Ministry of Finance needs probe them.

On the other hand, in as much as we know the inspection agents are more interested in the 1% Comprehensive Inspection Supervision scheme, its still necessary they remain a while to oversee technicallities in the scanning process.

Pre-RAR is a welcome development.

I agree with you but no matter how well they train NCS Nigerian factor will always be there.

In AP Moller issue i also agree with you they need to be probe.