Nigeria Customs Lose N551.3bn In Six Months

The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) lost N551.3 billion revenue in the first half of the year, New Telegraph has learnt.

The summary of revenue figure exclusively obtained by New Telegraph revealed that the Service generated N385.7 billion revenue from January to June this year, whereas the revenue target for the first six months was N937 billion.

This was against the N438.2 billion generated in the same period in 2015. The amount raked into the federation coffers for six months under review (January to June), comprises levies generated from excise duty, import duty, the Valued Added Tax (VAT) and the Nego- tiable Duty Credit Certificate (NDCC), wheat grain levy, 20 per cent charged on wine levy, 30 per cent textile levy, 60 per cent charge on rice levy and 100  per cent levy on cigarette. Of various fees collected, import duties accounted for N197.7 billion, while NDCC accounted for N203 million.

The document showed that N21.876 billion was generated from excise duty; N910.995 million from fees; N41.418 billion from federation account levies and N49.357 billion from non-federation accounts levies.

Also, N74.282 billion was generated from VAT during the period. The NSC Public Relations Officer, Mr. Wale Adeniyi, confirmed the revenue generation of the Service in the first half of 2016.

He said that the decrease of N551.3 billion in the revenue generated was due to economic recession. “What is released is a half year figure and we are hopeful and optimistic that we will meet our revenue target, but if the present situation persists which is beyond our control, there is nothing we can do.

“The issue of high exchange rate is there which is hampering importation and the 41 items prohibited from accessing CBN forex window is still there. “Generally, we are in economy recession and import section is not an exception,” Customs spokesperson, Wale Adeniyi, told New Telegraph in a phone conversation yesterday.

Also, Adeniyi told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) yesterday that “access to foreign exchange and the drastic fall in the value of naira have also affected the service’s revenue generation.”

The NCS said that the removal of the 41 items from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN’s) foreign exchange window affected the revenue generation by the service. He said: “However, there are positive indications that the economy may bounce back in the last quarter of the year.

“We (Customs) are working with Western neighbour of Benin Republic to strengthen our transit trade, particularly with vehicles. So, we expect that this will have a positive effect on our service revenue generation in the last quarter.”

The Service Comptroller- General, Col. Hameed Ali (rtd) had, last June, while briefing members of the National Assembly, said the agency lost a total of N138.9 billion in income generation in five months due to the forex policy of the CBN.

The figure, Ali said, represented 35.5 per cent in income generation expected from the agency between January and May 2016. Senate Committee on Finance summoned Ali for briefing on performance of the Customs.

Giving breakdown of revenue generation within the period, the Customs boss said compared to last year, there was deficit of 18,406,949,135.55 as N78,110,936,416.67, which was expected to be generated in January.

Ali said last February, Nigeria lost N27,176,737,878.21 and in March, N28,910,737,844.24 could not be realised from N78,110,936,416.67.

The revenue agency equally lost the sum of N32, 304,439,625.98 in April, while it lost N32,039,511,153.56 revenue in May. “The CBN forex policy has become a big problem to trade, therefore people are not importing and we are a nation that is dependent on importation. If people do not import, there will be no duty paid and Customs will have nothing to collect,” he said.

– New Telegraph

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