By Ifeyinwa Obi
COMPTROLLER  General of Customs (CGC), Dikko Inde Abdullahi has reiterated the readiness of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) to take over the Destination Inspection service provided by the four Service Providers when their extended contracts expire in June, some three months away.

Customs boss, Dikko

He said the Customs Service’s 2012 revenue was boosted by N90 billion underpayment it collected from the Risk Assessment Reports (RARs) issued by the Service Providers in the review year.

Speaking when he received members of the Senate Committee on Finance in his office in Abuja, Dikko assured that the agency would maintain its present momentum of revenue collections.

He said that in 2011, total revenue collected was N779 billion, adding: “Total collections increased to N850 billion in 2012, out of which N90 billion came from underpayments. This represents over 10 percent of our total collections for the year. We can then imagine the situation if Customs were to be fully in charge.”

He also said that the agency was in high spirit because its full statutory function was about to be restored after about 40 years it had been watching ‘the so called foreign experts’ do their jobs and take away huge sums of Nigeria’s meager resources.

Dikko said the agency made massive investments in human capital since he assumed office, “part of which includes the establishment of a world class Command and StaffCollege to provide middle and senior level management capacity building programmes for the Service.

The comptroller general added that the agency had begun an ICT revolution with the complete transformation of its operational processes to a regime of e-Customs operations from manifest submission to cargo exit. This he said, was followed with recent massive recruitment of over 7000 young graduates, some of them with IT background to bridge existing generation gap in the agency.

He also said that the agency had developed a new application system known as the Pre Arrival Assessment Report (PAAR) to replace the RAR currently issued by Service Providers; even as a new interactive Portal, known as the NIGERIA TRADE HUB, that provides online information and guidance about imports and exports to the international business community had been launched.

The Customs boss stressed that the agency now boasts “a highly motivated and trained workforce, fully ready to take over what belongs to Nigerians after over 40 years of watching the so called foreign experts.”

He further told the  senators that his management had done so much in the area of staff welfare, as it has constructed management staff quarters; corporate headquarters and modern staff clinic. He said massive accommodation for Junior and middle cadre officers; while a hanger and state of the art printing press had been provided.

He thanked the lawmakers for sharing the agency’s belief of the agency that the review of the Customs Act is a critical part of the modernization of the agency. “We, therefore, thank you for the pace and quality of work done so far on the CEMA amendments,” he said.