Officers and men of the Port Harcourt Area 11, Onne Command of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) have been charged to always ensure legitimate trade is facilitated.
This charge was given by the Zonal Coordinator of NCS Zone C, Assistant Comptroller General (ACG) SK Dangladima, during a visit to the command on Tuesday in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
He hinted that the core mandate of the agency was to collect revenue, facilitate trade and suppress smuggling, stressing that personnel should ensure that legitimate trade is facilitated, while customs brokers or agents must avoid wrong declaration.
“Let’s facilitate legitimate trade,” he declared.
Speaking on the staff training, he noted that going forward; promotion would be based on improvement on staff educational qualification.
“I advise you to go for junior or senior courses at Gwagwalada to improve yourself because promotion will be based on merit as customs is in a new era and for you to be promoted going forward, you must have passed through your junior or senior courses at Gwagwalada,” he posited.
On the movement of containers to bonded terminals, he emphasized that containers on transire should be escorted to their destinations without diversion while insisting that containers should not be delayed.
“Containers on transire should be escorted and make sure they reach their destinations. Please don’t delay containers. Work together and be your brother’s keeper,” the customs officer stated.
While speaking on the inter-agency collaboration, he said that other agencies involved in the examination and release of containers should be handy at all time to avoid unnecessary delays and ensure that containers are released in good time.
He scored Onne Customs Command Controller, Mr Mohammed Babandede, high on revenue generation, urging the stakeholders to assist in making sure that command achieves its revenue target for the year 2025.
Earlier in his address, Mr Babandede thanked his guest for the visit, assuring him that the revenue target for the year should be met.
He also informed him of some challenges his command was facing, including accommodation, operational vehicles, and the newly introduced B’odogwu platform, which he said has been having migration issues from Nigeria Integrated Customs Information System (NICIS) to B’odogwu most of the time as a result of network failure.