Almost two years after their sack from the ports, the National Agency for Food Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) are on their way back. The government has approved NAFDAC’s return. SON is said to be lobbying to return. Will their planned return bode well for the ease of doing buisness? Assistant Editor CHIKODI OKEREOCHA reports.
The signing of three executive orders into law by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo while acting as president raised hopes of eliminating the hurdles in the way of a bigger and more productive private sector. The aspect of the executive order, which sought to promote transparency and efficiency in the business environment, was particularly music to the ears of port users and real sector operators.
To them, the initiative set the stage for a major turnaround in their fortunes, as the delay in cargo clearance had become a pain in the neck. Their hope, therefore, was that the executive order would compel a systemic change in the way businesses and operations were conducted at the ports, and hopefully, change the narrative that clearing time for goods at the ports is said to be about the longest in the world.
For instance, it takes an average of 19 days to clear cargoes at Nigerian ports, whereas it takes seven and four days to do same in Cotonou and South Africa.
Operators blame the delay in cargo clearance in Nigeria on the multiplicity of government agencies at the ports. This was why the operators were joyful when, on the strength of the executive order, the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) announced that only seven agencies are allowed to operate at the ports.
NPA Managing Director Ms Hadiza Bala Usman was emphatic that the Federal Government’s directive of 2011, which reduced the number of agencies from 14 to seven, remained valid. Consequently, she said only seven agencies — NPA, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Department of State Security (DSS), Nigeria Police Force, Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) and Port Health Services — were authorised to operate at the ports.
Ms Usman, who spoke at a meeting with representatives of select government agencies and port stakeholders in Lagos, June last year, said under the arrangement, the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON), National Agency for Food, Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) were no longer allowed to have representatives at the ports or partake in the process of cargo clearance.
Others affected by the streamlining included the Directorate of Naval Intelligence (DNI), Federal Environmental Protection Agency (FEPA), Plant Quarantine, and Port Police alongside its Bomb Disposal Unit.
“We are trying to reduce the time and process in what we are doing and it is only when we abide by this that we can do that. I want to enjoin all of you to join hands with us and make sure that we implement this to the letter. When the orders are fully implemented, we will succeed in the mandate and it will also reduce time of doing business at the port,” Ms Usman said.
However, operators’ joy and Ms Usman’s expectation of a reduction in the time of doing business may have been short-lived. In what is seen by not a few operators and stakeholders as a major policy somersault, the Federal Government, a fortnight ago, gave NAFDAC the nod to return to the ports.
Basking in the euphoria of the agency’s return, its Director-General, Prof Christianah Adeyeye, said it would restore NAFDAC’s key responsibility of monitoring imports of sensitive chemical substances, food, drug and other regulated products.
She said in collaboration with relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and with the active support of the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), NAFDAC is returning to ports and borders to “effectively control the importation of narcotic drugs and chemical substances identified to be grossly abused and posing public health and security threats to the nation”.
“NAFDAC wishes to commend the Office of the NSA, the Chemical Society of Nigeria and other stakeholders for recognising NAFDAC as a key player in the national security architecture by the singular act of restoring the presence of NAFDAC officials at all designated ports of entry and land borders,” Prof Adeyeye said, exuding a burst of energy.
She argued that the laws that set up NAFDAC empowered it to statutorily operate at the ports. “The clearance of regulated products outside of the current legal framework poses immediate and life threatening risks to the public as unregistered, spurious and falsified products exit the ports without recourse to the agency’s approval for such products to be in the market,” Adeyeye said.
The agency’s comeback to the port, The Nation learnt, came on the heels of alleged clandestine moves by SON to find its way back to the port, even though the regulatory agency had denied such moves.
“Government in its wisdom removed SON from being at the ports. That singular action hampered the drive for reducing substandard products in Nigeria because today we are not at the ports so, we do not even know what is coming into Nigeria,”former SON Director-General, Dr Joseph Odumodu, said in an interview with newsmen in Lagos.
The SON’s Director, Inspectorate and Compliance, Mr. Bede Obayi, also reportedly said that since SON’s agents were withdrawn from the seaports, it has not been able to effectively monitor and control the influx of substandard goods into the country.
He said lack of SON’s presence at the nation’s seaports to check containers bringing goods into the country has accounted for a 200 per cent rise in the volume of substandard goods in the country in the last four years.
Recall that the Federal Government, through the Ministry of Finance, had in October 2011 ordered SON and some other agencies and various units operating at the nation’s seaports to vacate the place. Former Finance Minister and Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr. Mrs Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had explained that the action was necessary to reduce the number of agencies at the ports and facilitate faster clearance of cargoes as well as maximise government’s revenue.
The Nation learnt from reliable industry sources that almost 80 per cent of goods coming into the country enters through the seaports. “It is very bad for us to allow these goods to be coming in without SON being physically present to check them because importers may present fake certificates to other agencies that do not have the facilities to cross-check like SON would do,” Obayi said, in the heat of the agency’s push to return to the port.
Setback on ease of doing business
The return of NAFDAC to the ports and SON’s plan to come back are seen as a heavy blow to the Federal Government’s executive order on ease of doing business, particularly at the nation’s seaports.
According to experts, Nigeria’s extremely complex regulations and processes have made the business environment harsh and business transaction a harrowing experience. For instance, because of harsh operating environment, Nigeria occupied an unenviable position of 169 out of 189 on the 2016 World Bank Ease of Doing Business index.
This has continued to erode Nigeria’s global competitiveness, as cost of manufacturing products in the country has remained high. It is also the reason why the cost of finished goods in the country is high when compared to goods produced in countries with better ranking on Ease of Doing Business Index.
However, Credit Bureau Association of Nigeria (CBAN) Chairman, Mr. ‘Tunde Popoola, pointed out that Nigeria now ranks 145th out of 190 countries on the Ease of Doing Business index, compared to 169 in last year’s report.
Although, Popoola attributed this to efforts by the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council’s (PEBEC) initiative of which the Credit Bureaux played integral part last year, the return of NAFDAC and moves by other agencies to come back is seen as being capable of taking Nigeria back on the ease of doing business index.
This is so, considering warning by Partner and Chief Economist, Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC), a professional services firm, Mr. Andrew Nevin, that Nigeria’s transition to a non-oil economy would be an uphill task without a significant improvement in the business environment.
He also said this may affect projection that Nigeria’s economy could be among the top 10 in 2050 with a projected Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $6.4 trillion, surpassing Germany, the United Kingdom (UK), France and Saudi Arabia.
Recall that the overall objective of the executive order on ease of doing business was to stimulate a rebound of an economy gradually coming out of a debilitating recession and fast-track Nigeria’s transition to a non-oil economy.
This was why the initiative excited private sector operators, with the former President, National Union of Textile Garment and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria, Comrade Oladele Hunsu, expressing hope that the aspect of the order seeking to facilitate ease of doing business at the port will do away with the agonising bureaucratic bottlenecks that have been scaring away local and foreign investors.
Operators fear that with the return of NAFDAC and possible comeback of other agencies earlier sacked from the ports, Osinbajo’s instruction, based on the executive order, that Apapa Port should resume 24-hour operation, will no longer work. They also fear that the government’s target of achieving a 48-hour cargo clearance at the ports will not be achieved.
Such fears are hinged on the belief that the return of agencies earlier booted out of the port will harm efforts at harmonising agencies’ operations at the port into one single interface station as directed by the Vice President. His riot act to touts and corrupt officials at port may also not work.