The management of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, NSC, has directed freight forwarders operating at the nation’s seaports to ignore unauthorized policemen that are involved in the illegal interception of already cleared cargoes from the seaports.

The Nigerian Shippers Council, NSC which is the nation’s Port Economic Regulator, also serves as the industry anti-corruption watch-dog in its bid to ensure smooth trade facilitation in the nation’s maritime domain.

The Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, NSC, Mr Hassan Bello, has said that the proposed Inland Dry Ports, IDPs, will permanently take care of congestions at the seaports when completed and operational and enhance the nation’s cargo handling capacity.

The challenges facing Nigerian shippers are too many and from different directions. Apart from the issues of infrastructure in Nigerian ports environment that have impacted negatively on trade facilitation locally, importers have had to contend with the surcharges imposed on them by shipping agents who are acting on the dictations of multinational shipping lines under different conferences involved in the movement of goods from one continent to another.

The Nigerian Shippers’ Council, NSC, has called for the removal of obstacles to intra-regional integration in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) sub-region saying that it “will be beneficial to the small scale traders that conduct cross-border commerce within the region.”