Agency ReporterThe Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) is set to implement the tariff reduction on vehicles before the end of this month.The NCS Comptroller-General, Col. Hameed Ali (retd.), announced this on Sunday at the flagship News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum in Abuja.He said the commencement of the policy followed the transmission of the directive to the NCS by the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning.NAN recalls that on January 26, Ali said the NCS was awaiting directives from the Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning on the implementation of the Act.President Muhammadu Buhari signed the Finance Bill, 2020 into law on December 31, 2020, stipulating downward review of Excise Duty on tractors and motor vehicles for transportation.Read Also:Customs intercepts fake pharmaceutical products, other contraband worth over N869.6mThe Act has been transmitted to us. We received the ministers mandate this week to start working on it, although we have to develop certain regulations and measures on how we intend to implement the law.We have to change our codes to fit into the new law. You know that commercial vehicles levy is the only levy that has been reduced from 35 per cent to five per cent.So, we have to change the codes to fit into the new law and we hope we will finish that in two days and the minister will have to look at it and agree that it is what we should do.I hope that not too long from now, by next week or next two weeks, this law will come into effect. We will circulate it to our commands to begin to operate.The Customs boss noted that the new law would help the country to have vehicles meant for transportation with reduced duty for the benefit of Nigerians.Also, Ali said the Federal Government implemented the border closure policy to send a message to Nigerias neighbouring countries.When we abide by certain protocols on movement of goods across our borders, we discovered that those rules are no longer adhered to by our neighbours.We made multiple advances. We have reached across, we have signed papers in terms of MoU, but none of them worked.So, we were left with no option than to close our borders and send a message.We developed joint border drill to effectively close the borders and manned it and we now had to look at it that we cannot continue to close our borders so what do we do'We reopened it and we are now working with our neighboursour counterparts in Niger Republic and Benin Republic, he said.On the need for government at all levels to fight graft, Ali said the nations Judiciary is a critical element in the fight.Corruption is an area we are still grappling with. It is an area we need to do a holistic view of our system. If the Judiciary does not work, there is no way anything can happen.So, we must overhaul our Judiciary and overhaul the enforcement and, if these two work efficiently, corruption will be fought, he said.One of the strong pillars of our promise is that we are going to fight corruption. Of course, you know the President is somebody that has penchant for fighting corruption. He is incorruptible, he said.The Comptroller-General said he would like to be remembered for putting the NCS on a pedestal of fast development.I want to leave the Customs on a pedestal of training and enabling equipment. We need technology, we need modern technology for today and tomorrow.That is why we pushed and got approval for e-Customs. E-Customs is key to the survival and progress of the service.By the time we deploy e-customs, it will be an end-to-end automation, which means that from that moment, even on the table of every Customs officer, you wont find a paper. Everything will be electronic-based. That is our hope, he said.
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