Members of the Human Rights Defender and Advocacy Centre recently paid a courtesy visit to the the National Headquarters of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF) as more organizations continue to identify with the Anti- Corruption Unit of NAGAFF.
The Anti-Corruption Committee of NAGAFF continues to win wider supports as several organizations pledge their readiness to partner with it to check the menace of corruption in the maritime industry and the country at large.
NAGAFF’s Founder, Dr. Boniface Aniebonam expressed delight at the collaboration between his Association and the Human Rights Group, pointing out that corruption needs to be fought wholeheartedly in the country, to check its menace.
Dr. Aniebonam remarked that the maritime industry was capable of meeting the financial needs of the country by generating more than enough revenue if its potentials were fully tapped. However, he described the corruption in the Nigerian maritime sector as “the more you look, the less you see and he lamented that despite the appointment of a no-nonsense Rtd. Col. Hameed Ali as the Comptroller-General of Customs, corruption still thrives.
Mr. Innocent Agbo, the Vice President of the Human Rights Defender and Advocacy Center, commended NAGAFF for its efforts towards combating the menace of corruption. Agbo said his group decided to partner NAGAFF because of its vast experience in similar efforts expressing the desire of his group to tap from this wealth of experience.
The human rights group boss said corruption is a form of human rights abuse as it denies the people the benefit of enjoying the dividends of the resources which God has deposited in the country.
Meanwhiile, the National Chairman of the Anti-Corruption Committee of the NAGAFF, Chief Increase Uche, traced the history of the Association’s efforts at fighting corruption to the Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s era when the Freight Forwarders Vanguard of NAGAFF was registered by the ICPC under Rtd. Justice A.M.A. Akanbi.
The Anit-Corruption Committee Chairman said NAGAFF has taken the fight higher with his Committee’s status of the National Executive Council of the Association and called on all well meaning Nigerians to join the anti-corruption crusade.
