Five Star Logistics Ltd, a terminal operator, operating at the Tin Can Island Command of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) is owing the service an unpaid assessment to the tune of N97.3 million.
In a chat with journalists, the Public Relations officer of the Command, Uche Ejisieme disclosed that in the course of investigation and auditing, the system revealed an unpaid accumulated amount, hence the reason for the blockage.
He said, ”I can authoritatively confirm to you that the service has blocked the exit access for Five-Star Logistics following an investigation that led to the discovery of unpaid assessment to the tune of N97.3m,” the Command spokesman declared.
He declared that the management of the debtor terminal has engaged the command in discussions and has already gone to the Customs headquarters in Abuja to resolve the crisis.
Uche, while sympathizing with the importers whose cargoes are trapped in the terminal over the development, urged them to exercise patience while the terminal operators resolve the logjam.
He however hoped that the Five Star Logistics would resolve the impasse so they could go back to business as they are very strategic to the revenue generation profile of the command.
“We are hopeful that the company will expedite action in effecting payment so that they can go back to business because they are very strategic to us in the trade value chain”
Uche further declared that Customs would not condone any act by an operator to hold on to the Federal government money.
He explained that it was the system that triggered the investigation that led to the discovery of the debt, warning that the present automaton system by the Customs will expose any act of revenue compromise by anybody.
”It was in the cause of the investigation and auditing that the matter came up and the system now triggered on its own to reveal the unpaid assessment.
”That is one good thing about the system we are running now, there is no way anyone can escape any act of criminality such as duty evasion or compromise. You can hide anything as the system will automatically trigger by itself to expose any anomaly.
”The important thing is that they(Five-Star Logistics) are owing the government and I will advise them to go and pay. They are a very big organization and they can’t afford to just keep down the consignment of importers because of this small amount of money.
”If we are not convinced that they are owing, Customs will not close their access and Customs would not allow government money to be hanging.”, the Command image maker concluded.
The Customs clearing agents whose cargo are trapped inside the terminal of the debtor company have threatened to drag the operators to court for breach of agreement if by July 19th, 2022(next week Tuesday) the matter is not resolved and they be allowed to exit their cargo which they have already paid for their release.
Five-Star Logistics is one of the terminals at Tin Can port which specializes in handling vehicles.
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