The introduction of Authorized Economy Operator (AEO) programme to stakeholders at a seminar in Lagos last week by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) through a team led by the Deputy Comptroller General (DCG), Strategic Research and Policy (SR&P), Iferi Patience has been elicited mixed reactions from stakeholders. While the NCS is of the firm conviction that Nigerians like other nationals need to imbibe the relevant skills to actively engage in international businesses in line with the global best practices basically by embracing the AEO, stakeholders are of the firm belief that the initiative might suffer implementation setback, citing examples from related experiences in the past.
AEO, according to the World Customs Organization (WCO), entails international movement of goods as approved by or on behalf of a national Customs administration in compliance with WCO or equivalent supply chain security standards.
One of the facilitators at the seminar, AEO Team Leader, Zone “A”, Deputy Comptroller, Mark gave an insight to the AEO concept. She said the rise in volume of trade between and among countries, increasing security threats to the international movement of goods, and the changing trends in the supply chain compelled customs administrations to review the role of Customs in international trade.
It simply implies that checking through every trade item during goods examination is bound to halt world trade and same would happen should trade requirements not be harmonized. Hence the need for customs administrations to shift their focus more to securing the international trade flow and away from the traditional task of collecting customs duties.
In acknowledgement of these developments, the WCO drafted the WCO Framework of Standards to Secure and Facilitate global trade (SAFE). In the framework, several standards are included that can assist in meeting these new challenges which include striking a balance between the focus of business communities and the focus of Customs administrations via collaboration and has as its core part as developing an AEO. It also constitutes a yardstick that encourages mutual recognition of trading partners and so forms one of the sets of acceptable standards developed by WCO in order to avoid duplication of requirements.
DC. Mark explained that an AEO provides collaboration using three (3) pillars, Customs to Customs, Customs to Business and Customs to Government thereby necessitating the conveyance of the seminar to sensitize the Nigerian business community on the need for operations as AEO.
She highlighted the requirements for participating and registering to include: being an economic operator and part of the supply chain; record of compliance with customs legislation and taxation rules including no record of serious criminal offences relating to economic activity; no tax arrears; been operating in the country for the past three years, with clean track records; must have proper internal control of all imports, export and movement of the goods and many others.
The question is how feasible is this policy in our society? Nigeria is known for initiating policies which only end up in the waste bin. Most policy papers are now used by roadside peanut sellers to sell their goods. There was even a time the nation’s 2017 budget was declared missing after several months of delay before presentation and passage. This is to show the level of decay and how unserious and negligent our policy makers and enforcement agents in Nigeria are. There had been countless national summits on political, economic, social and security issues but none had seen the light of the day. The most recent is the national confab organized by Goodluck Jonathan administration with billions of naira from the commonwealth only to be sent to the archives by the succeeding Buhari’s administration. Isn’t it worthy of skepticism when a new policy said to rest on integrity, transparency and trust for its success is introduced to a nation characterized by clienteletisim, where political corruption has become a culture among the people?
DCG Iferi Patience while giving an overview of the policy explained that the AEO is a build up to the fast track system with an economic dimension which requires high degree of compliance in tandem with international standards. While emphasizing on integrity and transparency as imperative to AEO because of its regular evaluation and publication of work requirements, she said AEO is a programme that was introduced by the WCO to encourage traders who are stakeholders including freight forwarders, brokers, manufacturers, transporters and everybody on the supply chain to ensure that there is security and safety in the goods which they import from one country to the next and to give operators within the supply chain identity. To her, if everybody who is on board gets documented, it would encourage trade facilitation.
“We are now going to be talking about goods being sent after the documentation has been sent and this agree by the compliance between the trader and the rest of them. The goods will come in but would be exactly as declared and for the speedy clearance of goods because the person who sent it in is trusted and has been profiled, known and the compliance level is extremely high. We have people who want to be international businessmen, they have all it takes to export and import internationally but we are looking for groups of people that could represent Nigeria, as body that will send many goods out of this country and they could come on the list, if there is data exchange between Nigeria and the next country.
“We are also going to be talking about simplification of data so that we know and understand as customs what you are sending in is based and it agrees with the books. This usually is a web based programme so that by the time Nigeria adopts this and begin to practice, we know that we can exchange our list of stakeholders with the next country and the next country exchanges theirs. There would now be a mutual recognition of what each country is doing and they would sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that we agree. In the advanced worlds we have trade blocks already practicing. It is necessary for Nigeria to join the region, the West African Region, ECOWAS sub-region to also form a trade block that can exchange goods and the traders or stakeholders who are involved are documented, are known or accepted and data is exchanged without fear or favour and of course there are benefits to this; there will be speedy clearance, better revenue, and more secure cargo and at the end of the day we will know that Nigeria is safer with the kind of goods they are trading on.” She said.
Iferi expantiated further that the AEO programme is open to all stakeholders and offers varieties of opportunities and benefits as it would upgrade and expand the knowledge and territorial confines of whoever keys into it but warned that anyone who exercises double standard in the deal would be made to face heavy consequences.
“It involves everybody including all stakeholders because we have to depend on each other. Looking at the supply chain for instance, if something is coming packaged from somewhere, someone would do the packaging, and another person the labeling and packing into the truck before importation would be done by another person.
“We are also looking at those who do not comply after documentation, their licenses would be seized and they could even be referred to the ECOWAS Court, these are some of the advantages because we know that there is a place to go but above all what we look at in this programme is that Nigerians who are documented to carry on the base are going to step above one of the ladder when they were just local traders and they will now become international traders with global reputation.
“If you look at it, government introduced the policy of the ‘ease of doing business’ it implies that there are things which are slow in the system such as the bad roads we encountered when we were coming and something is being done about it.
“At the end of the day, if we are talking about the ease of doing business, everybody seems to be putting in so that the economic status of Nigeria will be great. We want a country that will be vast, that is what it’s about.” She said
DCG Iferi said the NCS would synergize with other agencies whose activities are involved like Standards Organization of Nigeria (SON), Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) and others in ensuring that the policy succeeds in Nigeria.
When quizzed on the possibility of sustaining the fast track programme alongside the AEO, she said the “Fast Track is a programme that has been more like an authorized operator, it does not have the economic viability in it. With this particular programme if you are not economically viable, what are you going to hold onto when you default? The authorized operator is there, we know but we are looking at a more recognized programme globally which is the way it is. So you don’t stop a programme that has started, you only advance on the programme and so this is supposed to be an upgrade.”
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Meawhile, the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA)’s National Publicity Secretary, Dr. Kayode Farinto opines that the policy is well conceived but allayed fears of poor implementation and hijack by foreigners. The ANLCA PRO suspects that if not properly executed, the AEO policy might lead to an indirect way of empowering some cabals at the detriment of the target beneficiaries. He therefore advocates for indigenization of the policy.
“I think it is a very good concept if it can be well implemented but my fear is that foreigners might hijack it again because it is an indirect way of getting employment for another set of people. You now find a situation where some of the shipping companies owned by foreigners would now say they are economic operators having been given the status. They want to ship, clear and be in economic custody of the cargo. It is going to cause crisis. We want to know who and who will be given this status by the NCS, we have allayed our fears to them and we hope that they will be good Nigerians. They should look inwardly; particularly into the issue of security and give it to Nigerians first before even talking of foreigners. The AEO should be solely for the indigenes of this country and that is the only way we can talk about security, employment for our youths and trade facilitation. This is very important.” Dr. Farinto said
On another note, a former chairman of the Council for Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN), Alhaji Olanrewaju Akeem has thrown his weight and support for the policy but also expressed worry on its workability because of the absence of trust and integrity among Nigerians and government agencies. He said AEO is not new as it has been in operations for many years in some advanced nations of the world.
“That’s how we started the fast track, but my concern with this AEO is how it will work. The project needs more training, needs integrity and attitudinal change. It has been working in some countries for over ten years and it is assisting their trade but in Nigerian reverse is the case because we have no integrity. However, with the government of the day led by President Muhamadu Buhari, I believe it can work because corruption is the killer of everything and with the way it is being fought now, if we can fight it to the zero level, it will work.” he said
The former CRFFN Chairman believes the programme is in continuity and in the long run other agencies would key into it and the AEO is “an advancement where you will take your consignment without paying to your yard, do everything and later you will pay your money. That will reduce congestions at the port but you have to keep your integrity intact and your profiling has to be sound. You have to deal with a sincere importer, so that what you declare is what you will see in your yard. I think with that it will work. They know that the ease of doing business is not working that is why they want to do this to enable seamlessness in doing business. That is why I advocated for attitudinal change. Some people are enjoying from someone’s ignorance somewhere because if everybody is on the same page, there is no way you will release a cargo here, even if it is at zero duty, somebody will now still hold it, take it to another place and tell you that he wants to do examination. There is no trust, no integrity and even the customs don’t trust themselves that is why they have different departments, but if there is trust and integrity, those things will not exist.” He explained.
Alhaji Akeem, while speaking exclusively with MMS plus frowned at the NCS for promoting unprofessionalism in the industry which could also serve as hindrance to the success of the AEO project via indiscriminate dish out of licenses to unqualified and untrained persons who operate as agents and freight forwarders. He is of the view that wherever training and adequate education is short, the industry or organization would suffer because such people might continue to act on the basis of ignorance or utmost naivety.
“I have made notes and it was published in the past that customs licenses are for sale and I categorized how it has been for sale. That is why I said if you have your money, anybody can buy license from customs. But can you be a pharmacist, lawyer or banker without going to school or passing through the training? Can you buy law or pharmaceutical certificate? So what are the criteria NCS uses in giving out those certificates? In advanced countries, you have to be a trained and certified person before you are licensed as Customs Agents. That has been the major setback in the industry. For instance, if you have a house boy, you enjoy his ignorance that’s why you call him a “house boy” but immediately you send him to school, he would want you to change that title of “house boy” to “house assistant” and he would do better than what he was doing as a novice. That is why the government itself through the national assembly enacted the act of 2007 to regulate the activities of freight forwarders in Nigeria. Customs is supposed to partner with CRFFN to train the agents. As it is now, if my son wants to be freight forwarder, he would want me to tell him the course to study at school. So government knows and that is why they enacted that law.
“According to the WCO records, this AEO has been on since 2005 but we are just waking up to start implementing it here. That is why I said in some countries they have been doing it for over ten years but we are just starting here and I know that it would work. Ten years ago, this is not how customs is, that is why I don’t believe in impossibility. Only people that know that they will be affected because of their involvement in corruption would be fighting against it so that it would not work.” he concluded.
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Copyright MMS Plus.
All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from Kings Communications Limited.
By Oyeniyi Iwakun
