The new measures put in place by the Nigeria Customs Service at the airport may be helping the system to yield more revenues, Suleinman Yahyah, chairman, Nigerian Aviation Handling Company plc, (nahco aviance), has said.
Yahyah, who made the disclosure during a courtesy call on Folorunso Adegoke, the custom area commander, Murtala Muhammed International Airport Command, during the week, also commended him for his efforts in providing the enabling environment for cargo revenues to increase under his leadership.
“The kind of sentiment being expressed by everyone as it concerns you is a pointer to the fact that you are a game changer, and we are proud of you. Your team has changed the game plan. This will help revenue to increase and the customer satisfaction will be achieved,” he said.
The nahco boss stated further that for two months the company has recorded a zero theft level and attributed the success to the ongoing collaboration between all the parties concerned, especially employees of nahco and the Custom Service.
Yahyah clarified that in the past two months, there had been no reported case of theft. He attributed this to measures put in place by nahco and the Customs.
He advised the Adegoke to regularly sit down with his team to align them with the overall objective of the measures put in place. He said this would reduce tension in the system.
On his part, the Custom boss said the reduction in the incidence of theft arose from the fact that appropriate capturing is being carried out by his men. This he said has greatly helped.
“We have a system that captures everything and everything is being recorded accordingly,” Adegoke added.
He further explained that what the Customs does now is to capture the details of the person(s) to whom consignments are delivered. He said if after the consignment had been delivered, it was found out that other goods were concealed under the delivered cargo, the Customs goes after the consignee.
He said that anybody who pays or is willing to pay the required fees had no issues with Customs.
“Once a particular trader is compliant, he has no issues with us. Once there is compliance, there won’t be any issue; it is non-compliance that can alter the peace. Kindly report anyone with issues,” said the Customs boss.
Adegoke admitted that a lot of importers are yet to get used to the fact that the game had changed.
On his part, Norbert Bielderman, managing director of nahco aviance, expressed his appreciation of the excellent working relationship with the Customs Area Commander.
He said the feedback he had received so far from his managers were quite encouraging.
