Onne Customs Collects N38.8b, Pursues Zero Tolerance For Infractions With N4.1b Seizures

Customs Area Controller (CAC) for Area ll Command, Onne Port, Comptroller Auwal Mohammed has urged officers and men in the area to be unrelenting and uncompromising in collection of revenue and implementation of government directives as they pertain to trade

Mohammed said this recently when he released figures showing a total of N38,877,314,286.12 as revenue collected  for the Federal Government for first quarter of 2021 by his command.

The collected figure is 69.4 percent higher than N22,950,780,163.43 collected between January and March 2020.

A breakdown of the 2021 monthly collections shows N12,123,024,011.82 for January; N12,760,546,062.07 for February and N13,984,744,212.23 for March . All monthly collections for this year have so far surpassed those of the first three months of 2020 with remarkable differences from which hovered at slightly above N7b monthly.

On anti-smuggling, the command recorded a total of 12 seizure with a cumulative duty paid of N4,120,882,608.03

The seizures comprises of 2 units of Used Mitsubishi buses; 210 bales of second hand clothing ; 1,435 pcs of used tyres ;Used engine gear box and auto spare parts ;310 pallets of laser ketchup and 20 bales of fabrics.

A month by month breakdown of the seizures indicates that 4 seizures were made in January which includes 3 containers and 2 suspects with duty paid value of N85,987,936.05 .

In February, the command made 3 seizures involving 4 containers with total duty paid value of N45,527,836.00 while in March 2021 it made 5 seizures involving 7 containers with duty paid value of N3,989,366,808.89

On export, the command processed 207,749.614 metric tonnes of cargoes with free on board value of $70,838,025.68 comprising of cashew nuts, ginger, hibiscus flower, sesame seeds, zircon sand, palm kernel, tiger nuts and many more.

Mohammed, under whose watch the Command has recorded it’s highest monthly revenue collection of N13 billion in the 38 year-old history of the command also urged officers to avoid being complacent and keep doing more to improve on national economy, security and trade facilitation.

Mohammed said: “We are doing well but I believe there are rooms for improvement in revenue collection, anti smuggling, trade facilitation and robust stakeholders’ engagements.

“Every likely or identified area of government revenue leakages should be blocked for us to sustain the tempo of maximum collections. We owe Nigeria a duty to make smuggling of prohibited items impossible through this command.

“Our ability to detect attempts at duty evasion and issuing demand notices to collect complete revenue from importers and their agents will be improved upon relying on technology and hands-on experience.

“Duty evaders should steer clear from this area as they are likely to be arrested with their wares seized in accordance with extant provision of the Customs and Excise Management Act (CEMA)

“While we await the deployment of scanners to aid our job, the due diligence employed in physical examinations to achieve outstanding results will be sustained and improved upon

“I hereby urge importers, exporters, licensed customs agents and freight forwarders interfacing with customs in Onne Port to see compliance as a key to unlock the many benefits derivable from their trade, investments and professions, the CAC said.