Despite Senate uproar Customs introduces technology for speedy vehicle duty payment

The Nigeria Customs Service seems not to be deterred by the sequence of drama surrounding its policy on vehicle duties.

The Comptroller-General of Customs, Col. Hameed Ali (Retd), despite his face-off with the Senate has announced a code number for efficient and effective vehicle duty clearance verification by Nigerians.

Ali disclosed this at a media stakeholders’ meeting which he said was to have a roundtable with stakeholders to come up with solutions to avoid orchestrating unnecessary hardship on Nigerians in regards to duty payment on old vehicles and verification.

He stated that the NCS had taken further steps to ensure that Nigerians, who wanted to verify the authenticity of their customs duty clearance, could do so with ease from the comfort of their homes with the use of their mobile phones.

“For effective and easy customs duty clearance verification, you can dial or send SMS to these numbers 094621597-9 with your vehicle C-number, the year you paid the duty and the port or location where the vehicle came through into the country.

“Immediately all that information is given, just in five minutes you will get a response whether your vehicle duty clearance is genuine or not,’’ Ali said.

He said the essence of the numbers was to ensure stress free verification, to motor dealers and innocent Nigerian vehicle owners.

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According to him, for easy traffic flow, the last number which is 7 in the digits 094621597 can be either changed to 8 or 9, to get response faster with different customs personnel on duty at every point in time.

Ali explained that the initial announcement was misunderstood by Nigerians and that customs intention regarding duty payment on old vehicles, was actually meant for motor dealers.

He added that customs later decided to give innocent private vehicle owners, who after verification, might find out that their vehicles had no genuine duty clearance to take advantage of the 60 per cent rebate.

The customs boss is still battling the Nigeria Senate over the introduction of the customs car duty policy, of which they are calling for a total reversal, an issue that is even yet to be addressed as the Senate insistence that Ali appear at plenary in Customs uniform seems to be turning out into an all out war between both parties.

By Akin Obakeye

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