By Godfrey Bivbere

THE Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria, CRFFN, has accused government regulatory agencies in the maritime sector of abandoning their duties to focus on revenue generation.

The Registrar of CRFFN, Samuel Nwakohu, while speaking at a stakeholders’ consultative forum aimed at creating a standard operating procedure, SOP, for clearance charity goods by non governmental organisations’, NGOs and civil society organisations’, CSOs, accused the National Agency for Foods, Drugs Administration and Control, NAFDAC, Standards Organisation of Nigeria, SON; Nigerian Shippers Council, NCS;, Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA, etc. of being involved.

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Nwakohu said: “These government agencies want to ensure that revenue is not lost and they want to guide it jealously. However, we should still put human face to whatever we do and there is too much bureaucracy.

“The various regulatory agencies are no more regulatory agencies but are revenue-generating agencies; when you are through with that, Customs will insist that you must open Form “M” for you to get your goods cleared and you must follow the clearance procedure.
“Many a time, Customs’ requirements result in some charity goods being abandoned in the ports uncleared.”