Following the reoccurring network failures of the Customs Server, the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF) 100% Compliance Team has formally petitioned the Federal Ministry of Finance following the recurrent server failures within the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) infrastructure.
These failures, according to the team have led to severe consequences, including substantial financial losses at the Lagos seaports.
In a letter addressed to the Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, the NAGAFF team expressed deep concern over the ongoing challenges caused by the Customs Service server malfunctions which have lasted for a while now.
These challenges, they emphasized, have resulted in hardships, increased demurrage fees, and significant revenue losses for stakeholders within the shipping industry.
“We are taken aback as to why such outfit that has over the time manifested gross incompetence is hired…”
Alhaji Tanko Ibrahim, the National Coordinator of the Compliance Team, highlighted the gravity of the situation by revealing that NAGAFF members were currently facing considerable financial losses.
With approximately 1,600 containers trapped at each of the major ports including Apapa, Tin Can, PTML, and Kirikiri Lighter terminal respectively, members’ daily losses have exceeded the sum of N192,000,000 (One hundred and ninety-two million naira)
According to him, when the sum is multiplied by more than two thousand containers that are equally denied exit from off dock terminals, due to the server failure/breakdown, the consequential effect is better imagined than experienced.
The full text of the letter reads:
“The Honorable Minister Sir, we are deeply saddened to inform your good office that for the last three weeks, we have been saddled with an unbearable yoke of intermittent server collapse and or failure in the Nigeria customs service platform.
Sir, this breakdown and failure of customs servers have in no small measure occasioned unimaginable hardship, demurrage, loss of revenue, and serious disruption of services in the maritime industry. The attendant losses are better imagined both for us as freight forwarders and for the federal government.
“The Honorable Minister Sir, we as stakeholders and users of the customs servers are going through a lot in the hands of our teeming customers, shipping companies and terminal operators. This is so as the terminal Operators charge the sum of (sixty-two thousand naira) per day. The Shipping companies charge #58,000.00 (fifty-eight thousand naira) per day.
“For instance Sir, we have an average of 1,600 containers trapped by the server failure in each of the ports of Apapa, Tin Can, PTML and Kirikiri Lighter terminal respectively, with an estimated sum of #192,000,000 (One hundred and ninety-two million naira) being lost daily.
Personnel On Fastrack Cargoes
“When this sum is multiplied by more than two thousand containers that are equally denied exit from off-dock terminals due to the server failure/breakdown, the consequential effect is better imagined than experienced. This had been a recurring decimal over time with the customs service provider, namely, WEBB FONTAINE.
“Sir, it is now being alleged that a new outfit or new service provider has been appointed to replace the WEBB FONTAINE. If that is the case, Honorable Sir, we respectfully call for a total review of their contract because the situation has degenerated into an unbearable state.
“We are taken aback as to why such outfit that has over time manifested gross incompetence is hired and allowed to oversee such critical infrastructure of the Nigeria customs service,” the letter explained.
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