The ongoing reorganization in the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has put officers and men of the organisation on their toes. In this report, Yusuf Alli, Remi Adelowo and John Ofikhenua review events which shaped the appointment of the new Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Customs Service, Col. Hammed Ali and the tasks at hand.
These are very interesting times in the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), unarguably Nigeria’s second highest revenue generating agency, after the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). The voluntary retirement of Abdullahi Dikko Inde as the Comptroller General of the organisation in August and the subsequent appointment of Col. Hammed Ali (rtd) as his replacement by President Muhammadu Buhari is, predictably, shaking the very essence of the NCS.
Ali’s appointment was most unexpected. A very close associate of the President said he was the least considered for the top job following speculations on the exit of Dikko Inde.
In the beginning
The exit of Dikko Inde was not unexpected after all. Appointed in 2010 by ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, his job was considered to be on the line with the inauguration of Buhari as President on May 29. Indeed, the NCS, perceived by many Nigerians as one of the most corrupt government agencies, was slated for a massive shake-up once the President settles down in office. But that was not to be, as Dikko Inde was given the grace to stay on.
The former Customs boss obviously had his plans, which he kept close to his chest. On August 3, Dikko sent a Notification for Retirement to President Buhari. A source close to the ex- CG said he opted to retire at that point, because he felt that if he remained in service until he is 60, which is about six years from now, his staff development programme will be jeopardized, because by then, many trained and experienced officers would have retired.
According to sources, he reasoned that many current Comptrollers, Assistant Comptroller Generals (ACGs) and Deputy Comptroller Generals (DCGs) will retire by then; hence he decided to bow out in order to give them a chance to grow.
Before he took the action, the Katsina State-born Dikko was subjected to severe attacks by some groups due to what sources say was his perceived closeness to ex-President Jonathan.
Within the same period, a pressure group, the Nigeria Customs Transparency Initiative (NCTI), had dragged Dikko before the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) urging it to probe him over allegations of abuse of office.
Apparently aware that several powerful interests within and outside the organisation wanted him out, the ex-Customs boss threw in the towel to silence those making several allegations against his six-year tenure in office, it was gathered.
A source who spoke to The Nation disclosed that contrary to insinuations in some quarters that Dikko was prematurely forced out having lost the confidence of the President, the man’s decision to leave the service was voluntary.
“Nothing could be farther from the truth (premature retirement),” said the source who added, “Dikko left on a high. He felt he had done his bits and needed to give younger officers opportunities to grow. This much he told the President, who gave his nod.”
Reiterating his claims that the ex-Customs boss had the President’s confidence, the source said, “On the day Dikko retired, an ultra-modern Customs Clinic was commissioned in Karu by Governor Nasir El-Rufai, a confidant of the President. So, you can see mischief makers were behind the rumour that Dikko was summarily fired by the President.”
On August 14, the President approved Dikko’s request to proceed on voluntary retirement.
The President, in the approval letter he signed personally, thanked Dikko for his service to the nation for six years.
The President’s letter titled, ‘Voluntary retirement from the Nigeria Customs Service’ and dated August 14, reads: “Dear, Alhaji D.I. Abdullahi, I write to acknowledge the receipt of your letter Ref. No. NCS/ADM/HQ/P. 35802 of 3rd August, 2015 conveying your decision to voluntarily retire from the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) with effect from Tuesday, 18th August, 2015.”
Succession drama
It was an emotional scene at the headquarters of the NCS at the pulling out of Dikko.
Men and officers could not hold back their tears, as the man they credit for improving on the fortunes of the Customs and welfare of personnel was taking his final salute in uniform.
After Dikko’s departure, his second in command, Mr. John Atte, inspected a guard of honour signalling his taking over of the NCS pending the appointment of a new CG.
And the waiting game over who would succeed Dikko began.
In groups of twos and more, Customs officers and men gathered in groups discussing in hushed tones on whether or not Atte will be the substantive CG.
As minutes rolled into hours, journalists were told to converge on the Conference Room situated on the fifth floor of the imposing Customs headquarters for briefing.
Not a few of the reporters present thought the announcement of the new helmsman of the NCS would be made. But that was not to be. Much later, an Assistant Comptroller sauntered in and announced that the briefing has been postponed indefinitely. Atte’s tenure as acting CG turned out to be very brief. Just about two weeks. On August 27, Hammed Ali was appointed as the new CG by President Buhari.
Unease among the five DCGs
The Nation reliably gathered that Ali’s coming on board was a hard pill to swallow for the five DCGs, all of whom had nursed the hope that they would be considered to succeed Dikko.
The DCGs include John Atte in charge of Finance and Technical Services; Adewuyi Akinade in charge of Tariff and Trade, while Mr. Nwosu Chukwuma headed Strategic Research and Policy. Others are Musa Tahir, Enforcement, Investigation and Inspection; Aliu Gabriel for Excise, Free Trade Zone and Industry Incentives and ?Ibrahim Mera who headed Human Resource Development?.
Multiple sources disclosed that one of the DCGs, who hails from the North, had positioned himself for the top job using his highly placed contacts to get the President’s nod.
The man was even alleged to have leaked sensitive documents during Dikko’s last days in office in order to portray his former boss in bad light. But with the man and his four other colleagues losing out, it was obvious that their days in office were numbered. Not even assurances from Ali that he was not out to witch-hunt anyone could put them at ease.
Apparently for strategic reasons, Ali did not set out carrying out a massive restructuring of the Customs. For weeks, he received comprehensive briefings from his lieutenants before embarking on a tour of all Customs formations and a visit to major stakeholders in the security and maritime sectors. The tour is still ongoing.
For the now retired DCGs, deep down in their hearts, they knew that it was just a matter of time before they are given the boot.
The final moments for these officers came a few weeks ago following a directive by Ali to them and other top ranking officers of the Service to declare their assets.
That was the final straw. As a source painted the scenario that played out immediately this directive was issued: “It (directive) jolted the officers to no end. They regarded the directive as a clear message they are no longer wanted in the system. For them, declaring their assets was akin to committing suicide.”
Joint retirement
The announcement came like a bang. Not even Ali, the new Customs boss saw it coming.
At about 10am on October 29, the five Deputy Comptroller Generals (DCGs) tendered their resignation letters to Ali.
The resignations took immediate effect.
They thanked the Federal Government for allowing them reach the height of their careers and averred that there was “no more height to aspire to in the Customs.”
Sources disclosed that the shocking resignation came after Ali approved a roster of annual leave for the DCGs.
Sequel to this, the DCGs allegedly convened an emergency secret meeting where they all decided to tender a voluntary retirement notice. Their decision to write a joint retirement letter, however, raised eyebrows. A top Customs officer in his reaction to this says, “Why send a joint retirement letter? Did they join the Service on the same day?”
More Tsunami
Barely 24 hours after the voluntary resignation of the five DCGs, the NCS fired 34 senior officers.
The sack was made known in a statement signed by Public Relations Officer for the Comptroller- General of Customs, Wale Adeniyi.
The terse statement read: “As part of on-going re-organisation in the Nigeria Customs Service, 34 senior officers have been retired from Service with immediate effect. The re-organisation of the Service is one of the core mandates of the Comptroller-General of Customs, Col. Hameed Ali (rtd).”
Three other officers of the rank of Assistant Comptroller-General were also affected.
They include the Secretary to the Nigeria Customs Board, Madu Mohammed; Zonal Coordinator Zone ‘A’, Victor Gbemudu, and Assistant Comptroller-General, (Headquarters), Bello Liman.
New DCGs
To fill the vacant positions, six acting Deputy Comptrollers-General were quickly named.
They are Idris Suleiman (Finance Administration and Technical Service); Iya Umar (Tariff and Trade); and Dan Ugo (Enforcement Investigation and Inspection). The rest are Grace Adeyemo (Excise, FTZ & Industrial Incentive); Austin Warikoru (Human Resource Development) and Paul Ukaigwe (Strategic Research and Policy).
Similarly, the CG appointed eight ACGs. They are Umar Sanusi (ACG Headquarters); Funsho Adegoke (ACG ICT); Mohammed Abbas (ACG Board); Olatunji Aremu and Charles Edike, Abubakar Dangaladima (Zonal Coordinator Zone B); Azarema Abdulkadir (Zonal Coordinator Zone C); and Chidi Augustine (Zonal Coordinator Zone D).
The DCGS and ACGs are to immediately take their new positions in acting capacity.
Also as part of the ongoing reorganisation, seven officers were equally redeployed in the new exercise. They are ACG Adesina Odunmbaku (Finance and Technical Service); ACG Robert Alu (Tariff and Trade); ACG Ade Dosumu (Enforcement and Drugs); ACG Monday Abueh (Excise & Industrial Incentive); ACG Ahmed Mohammed (Human Resource Management); ACG Patience Iferi (Strategic Research and Policy) and Comptroller Aminu Abba (Technical Services).
Ali in the saddle: The challenges at hand
From all indications, there is no doubting the fact that Ali is determined to fully execute the brief handed him by the President, which are “Restructure, Reform and Revenue”. But he has some challenges at hand including increasing the revenue profile, tackling smuggling and tax / duties evasion, ridding the service of bad eggs, reorientation of the mindset of Customs officers and enhanced welfare.
Revenue palaver/ foreign exchange restriction on 41 items
With dwindling revenue from oil, all eyes are on Ali to deploy his magic wand to increase the revenue profile of the Customs Service. A service noted for many revenue leakages and loopholes, Ali has a herculean task at hand. The new CG is in the saddle at a time that there is foreign exchange restriction on 41 items. The Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN) suspended foreign currency funding of these 41 imported items to preserve the nation’s depleting foreign reserves stock and boost production activities in the country. The items include, vegetable oil , metal boxes, galvanised steel cement, margarine, palm kernel, poultry products (chicken, eggs and turkey), Indian incense, tinned fish in sauce (Geisha, Sardines), cold rolled steel sheets, roofing sheets, wheelbarrows, head pans and containers, and enamelware. Others are cosmetics, soap, plastic and rubber products, steel drum, steel pipes, wire mesh, steel nails, wire rods, security wire, wood particle and board, wood fibre boards and panel, plywood board and panel, wooden doors, toothpicks, glass and glassware, kitchen utensils, tableware, tiles and wooden fabrics.
Already, the statistics suggested a slight drop in revenue or stable profile of the current rate. So far, the NCS collected N747.4billion into the Federation Account between January and October this year. With barely two months to the end of the year, it was obvious as at Friday that the NCS may not be able to match 2014 record when it raked in N977.09 billion , which was a shortfall of N223 billion from the N1.2 trillion projected for last year. According to a document, the breakdown of the Customs Service revenue collection profile this year is as follows: N73.2 billion (January); N69.5billion (February); N78.9billion (March); N71.4billion (April); N68.4billion( May); N76.4billion(June); N77.6billion(July); 78.2billion(August); N74.7billion(September) and N78.4 in October.
The document shows an average of N74.7billion collection in 10 months. But the collection under Ali’s watch was an average of N77.1billion in three months.
The Public Relations of Officer of NCS, Mr. Wale Adeniyi however expressed hope that the NCS would record increase in revenue generation in the ’ember’ months to make up for the shortfall in its target. He said: “A number of factors determine how much we generate. The most important thing will be the rate of importation, if the volume of importation drops, you would expect that the revenue that will accrue from the importation will also drop.
“This has been the trend generally in the last three, four months. And I will say that this is not peculiar to the Customs sub-sector. There has been a general downturn in the economy; we hope that as the ’ember’ months come, we will be able to make up for the shortfalls that have been identified in one or two places.”
On the 41 items, Adeniyi said, “I don’t see the revenue we would have earned from these items as absolute loss anyway because the intention of the policy is to manage our forex fortunes optimally and save forex for the raining day.
“There seem to be a free drop of the Naira. There was need for urgent action to arrest the downward fall. So, this is one of them. So I believe there will be need for that kind of sacrifice in the economy.
“So I don’t see it as an absolute loss to the Nigerian Customs Service. I am not seeing it as a serious challenge. I believe that with time we will stabilize and Nigerians will learn to use forex optimally for things that are absolutely necessary and not for luxury items and not for inconsequential things.
“Nigerians should see the current restriction of forex not as a punishment by the government of Nigeria. We must see it as a short term pain that we must understand and we must understand and bear with. The intention is to dedicate the better part of our forex to things that are productive in the economy because it is the productive section of the economy that owns the solution to our economy.
“Nigerians should learn to be patient about it and understand the need that our emphasis, that our resources, should be tied to those things that are productive, that add value to the economy and create jobs for the teeming masses rather than wholesale importation of everything whether they are luxury items, whether they are inconsequential items like tooth picks.”
Battling smugglers/ tax waivers/ exemptions
Faced with porous borders, the nation is losing about $3 billion annually to smugglers to the advantage of neighbouring countries, especially the Republic of Benin whose huge revenue comes from smuggling of goods into Nigeria. From Seme border to Chikanda, Illela, Kishi, Jibiya, Onitsha and Port Harcourt, virtually every product is smuggled into the country irrespective of prohibition list by the Customs Service. The list of losses to smugglers include 400,000 barrels of oil daily; about $2billion poultry products; about N345 billion worth of exportable shea butter; over $1b for pharmaceuticals; seizure of 200,000 trailer loads of rice valued at N1.35 billion; and others. In 2013 alone, 46 customs officers were killed by smugglers. The Poultry Association of Nigeria (PAN) in May said Nigeria currently loses over $2 billion to smuggled poultry products. The National President of the association, Dr. Ayoola Oduntan, said over 1.2 million tonnes of smuggled poultry products, mainly frozen chicken and turkey, had impacted negatively on poultry farmers in the country. He said the local production had been at about 300,000 tonnes. He added: “Nigeria cannot continue to be a subtle dumping ground for all kinds of poultry and poultry products. Considering the high level of unemployment in the country, the government must do everything it can to reopen closed farm and develop the poultry industry, rather than wasting hard earned foreign exchange on products that gives nothing but financial losses to the economy.”
Breaking the jinx of tax waivers and exemptions in a politically volatile environment like Nigeria is a nightmare for Ali. This is an area where Ali will step on toes when pressure comes from either the presidency and the big players in the economy or from supervising minister. The immediate past Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, said about N170.74billion waivers and tax concessions were granted to various government and private businesses between 2011 and 2013. At the same time about the NCS lost about N627.07billion revenue within the same timeline of three years. An NGO, Action Aid and Tax Justice Network Africa said in a report in August that four members of ECOWAS(Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal) lose an average of $9.6billion revenue every year to tax incentives and waivers. Out of the huge loss, Nigeria accounted for about $2.9 billion (N577 billion) to waivers every year.
The Public Relations of Customs Service however said: “He (Ali) has particularly emphasized the issue of smuggling, warning officers to ensure that smuggling is reduced. Of course the interpretation of this will be that goods that were being smuggled, if they come up to pay duty it will shore up our revenue.
“So far, over N1billion has been realized from rice, particularly those that come in from the border stations. So this is one major change he has introduced because before now rice is smuggled in big volume across the border stations. Because the importation of rice was restricted through the borders we could not even generate revenue from them even when they turn up, but since the reversal of that particular directive, we have been having rice in big volumes through the borders, and they have been paying.
“And you can see from the revenue profile that the Area Commands that have boarder stations have had increase in their revenue particularly in the North West and in the South West.”
Anti-corruption war
This is a banana peel that every successive Comptroller General of Customs Service has been avoiding. It is a war Ali must fight with an unyielding focus because no CG has ever won the battle. All the past CGs who attempted a cleanup of Customs Service were also consumed. The war has been difficult to wage because corruption is already a way of life such that new recruits go into the service only to make money. Ali is also in the midst of billionaires and millionaires who will find it extremely difficult to adjust to the new ethos. Instead, the cartels in Customs Service will deploy their arsenals to sabotage the new helmsman. The mass resignation or retirement of the DCGs was a pointer to the existence of a “powerful cult” in the system. A high-ranking Customs Officer said: “These cartels have groomed and positioned their surrogates to the extent that the next five generations of leaders in NCS will be at their beck and call. They can tolerate Ali for four or eight years but the corruption syndicate cannot be uprooted in Customs Service. We are only praying for Ali to go far in his reforms.”
But right from his first day in office, Ali drew the battle line. He said: “Since I took over, I have been receiving briefing notes to enhance my understanding of the Nigeria Customs Service. I have articulated some ideas to start with, and I have found it necessary to share these ideas with you. These ideas shall be the guiding principle and platform for a smooth takeoff.
“First and foremost, it is important that we know where we are going. We can start by ensuring that we pick up the mantle of Mr. President’s policy thrust. Therefore, in conjunction with you, moving with you and fighting with you we will fight corruption and restore discipline through attitudinal orientation for effective service delivery.
“However, I must stress this for emphasis. I will not tolerate indiscipline. I will not tolerate corruption. I have zero tolerance for corruption.
“Considering my military background, I believe punishment must be punitive for others to see as deterrent. Therefore, as an officer of the Nigeria Customs service, if you are caught involved in corruption, I am not only going to dismiss you, I will make sure I prosecute and jail you. That is basic!”
17 agenda, mindset and welfare
Besides the war against corruption in the service, Ali reeled out 17 other agenda to reposition the Customs Service. In an unprecedented manner, Ali has traversed more than 70 per cent of the borders to identify with Customs officers on ground. He said: “We will optimally achieve the core statutory functions of the service, of revenue collection, trade compliance, and facilitation, anti-smuggling activities, national security amongst others, based on the service motto of “Honesty and Justice”.
“We will commensurately further enhance the welfare of officers and men for maximum service delivery. We will ensure the strict application of Customs and Excise Management Act (CEMA) CAP-C45 Laws of Federation of Nigeria (LFN) as amended 2004, Customs codes, Extant Laws and Federal government’s circulars in all customs operations, through training and re-training of officers and men on how to apply them in their day to day operations.
“We will address all anomalies manifest in recruitment, training, posting and promotion of officers and men of the service. All Customs officers and men shall adhere strictly to the Customs clearance, guidelines and procedures. All Customs Area Controllers, Head of Units and Departments shall be held accountable for all established infractions to do with false declaration, deliberate misapplication of the tariff, undervaluation and concealment.”
The Customs boss, according to the spokesman, has been addressing the mindset of the officers and stakeholders.
Adeniyi added, “He (Ali) has managed to convinced them that it is Nigeria first. It is the economy first before any other thing.”
The Customs boss is also said to have placed emphasis on improved welfare for the men and officers of the Nigeria Customs, especially with emphasis on infrastructure and accommodation.
The spokesman said Ali has not minced any word in saying that he will approach the President and ask for better condition of service when there is corresponding revenue generation.
What next for Ali?
Uneasy lies the task ahead for Ali, he needs to be creative, deploy technology and motivate his officers and men to restore the Customs Service to its era of high-yielding revenue. At the end of the day, he will not be judged by how many whips he inflicted on errant customs officers but he will account for the revenue generated by the Service. Being a neophyte in Customs service, this is the time to learn faster as a soldier on an emergency assignment.
The nation awaits his revenue Sit-rep.
