The Nigeria Customs Service and Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN) have begun collaboration to arrive at a stable foreign exchange rate for clearance of imported goods into the country.
This was, as the Service confirmed , its revenue collection leaped by 74% growth in the last one year( between June 2023 to June 2024).
From N2.58 trillion revenue collected in 2023, the Service revenue went up to N4.49 trillion in June 2024, Comptroller General of NCS Wale Adeniyi disclosed the figures on Thursday at a press briefing to evaluate his one year stewardship as NCS helmsman.
Adeniyi who was appointed exactly one year ago by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu said the revenue performance was buoyed by a sustained increase of 70.13% in average monthly revenue collection compared to the previous year. Adeniyi said the Service has been collecting on an average monthly , revenue in the sum of N 343 billion, compared to previous N 202 billion monthly average.
Adeniyi attributed substantial revenue collection to various reforms, initiatives undertaken by the Service in the last one year.
“Notably, there was a substantial 122.35% rise in revenue collection during the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period in the previous year. These gains were attributed to various strategic initiatives that led to rankings of additional revenues.
For example, he listed the N15 billion recovery by the Revenue Review Performance Recovery exercise, N2.79 billion recovered from the 90-day window for the regularisation of the documents of uncustomed vehicles; N1.5 billion recovered from the decongestion of 1,705 overtime containers and 981 vehicles from the port.
“It is also worthy to note that on June 13, 2024, NCS recorded a daily all-time-high of N 58.5 billion in revenue collection and the deployment of officers to sensitive posts on the basis of merit and capacity”, he said.
For seizures, the Service recorded 63 seizures related to animal and wildlife products valued at ₦566 million.
Additionally, seven seizures of arms and ammunition were made through on nation’s ports and borders. In terms of illicit drugs, a combined total of 127 cases involving narcotics and pharmaceutical products were seized, valued at over ₦6 billion.
Nigeria’s businesses have had to cope with unstable forex rate policy for the clearance of goods at the Nigera’s sea ports, thus preventing businesses from having a stable plan.
To remedy the situation, Adeniyi disclosed yesterday that,” with the support of Minster of Finance, NCS is working in close collaboration with the CentralBank of Nigeria to achieve a stable rate for import of goods to enable business plan activities”.
On customs modernisation, Customs CG said the service engaged relevant stakeholders to ensure deliverable of the customs modernisations were met while it continued to phase out manual processes with automation.
On trade agreements, “NCS is working closely with relevant stakeholders to ensure that the implementation of trade agreements like the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) yields the desired benefits to Nigerians. Moreover, the Service has signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with strategic trade partners like China Customs and recently is working with the Benin Customs to facilitate the creation of a new joint border post along the Segbana-Tsamia border with the Republic of Benin at Kebbi”.
” On National Security, the service will continue to work with relevant national and international agencies to share intelligence and develop structured frameworks to ensure that those seeking to disrupt the peace and stability of the nation does not go unpunished”, he added.
He decongestion of ports and the opening of hitherto blocked access road has improved trade facilitation tremendously. The effort, he said led to improvement in NCS ranking by the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC), with NCS moving up 33 places, tied at the top with 4 other MDAs out of the 36 MDAs assessed, with a percentage score of 100%, marking a 81.5% increase.
