Customs issues one week deadline to revenue defaulters to comply
The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has given a one week deadline to beneficiaries of duty payment concessions that defaulted in honouring their obligations to comply or risk being exposed in the national dallies.
In a statement signed by Wale Adeniyi, public relations officer, and made available to BusinessDay, Dikko Inde Abdullahi, comptroller-general of Customs, disclosed in Abuja while reviewing the activities of the Revenue Recovery Team set up to address dwindling revenue, that the defaulters include importers who were given various forms of deferred payment concessions to avoid accumulation of demurrage so as to facilitate trade.
Others, the statement added, include importers with unutilised Risks Assessment Reports (RARs) still hanging in the system long after the departure of the Service Providers that issued the RAR during their dispensation.
“We can no longer tolerate them abusing the privilege. We are reminding the banks that their bonds were provided to guarantee payment of Customs duty. We have given defaulters only one week to pay all outstanding duties, failure of which their names will be published in the national dailies,” he declared.
The Customs boss also directed that the bank bonds secured to cover the defaulting transactions, be converted to duty payments at the expiration of the grace period. Within the first month of Recovery Team’s activities, a total of N2.5bn was recovered from unpaid assessments and un-utilised RARs.
On temporary importation, a total of N1.6bn outstanding has been established against three beneficiaries who contravened the regulations. The defaulting beneficiaries applied for and enjoyed temporary importation concession right while they had active ‘Forms M’ and RARs against their names.
The team currently has over 2,000 companies under investigation. Transactions of RARs and unpaid assessment of these companies are undergoing a comprehensive audit to confirm evidence of RAR utilisation and duty payments.