Nigerian importers lose about N80bn annually due to the inefficiency of shipping companies and terminal operators, a maritime industry pressure group, Advocacy for Maritime Development Association of Nigeria, has said.
The President of AMDAN, Segun Alabi, who disclosed this in a chat with Financial Street on Wednesday, also accused shipping companies, and terminal operators of disrupting the Federal Government’s ease of doing business through an orchestrated collusion to delay container return.
Lamenting that Nigeria was being used as a dumping ground for disused containers from maritime West/Central Africa, Alabi said, “Nigeria is bleeding and our health is sagging. Do you know that all traffic hiccups and terrible gridlock of container trucks you see overwhelming us around Lagos ports are orchestrated and masterminded by a clique? It is indeed a conspiracy against the people and the economy of Nigeria.
“Do you know that shipping companies collect money for offloading containers in a bonded terminal? Why? I am talking from a personal experience and from the findings of our investigations.”
The AMDAN boss added, “If a truck driver approaches a bonded terminal to drop an empty container after probably staying on queue for days, the terminal manager and the shipping company’s representatives ask him to pay handling charges for their reachstacker to offload the empty container. This is about N50,000 to N150,000.
“If he fails to cooperate, he will have to wait for days during which the driver’s health suffers, the truck owner loses money and, the most painful is that, the importer loses his container deposit fee. When you add this extortion money cumulatively, it amounts to N80bn annually taken slyly from our importers and freight forwarders.”
Alabi maintained that the traffic gridlock would remain because some people were benefiting from it, adding, “It is one huge extortion racket running into billions, bleeding and punishing our people.”
He said the group had complained to the Nigerian Shippers’ Council and asked the regulator to intervene.
“We have met top officers of the customs about these problems and hope they can be of help in finding solutions. And we are also very worried about the new official exchange rates of naira to the dollar for customs clearing. At N405/$1 (exchange rate), prices of goods and services will skyrocket and the common man will suffer for it gravely.
“As an advocacy group, we call on the Federal Government and customs authorities to rescind this decision or find a midway solution by reducing the exchange rate,” he said.
