FG threatens to revoke freight forwarders’ licenses

The Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, has threatened to revoke the licenses of freight forwarders if they fail to resolve their differences with the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) within two weeks.
 The directive may not be unconnected to controversies over who should be responsible for the registration of freight forwarders.
The minister maintained that the Nigeria Customs cannot register brokers. He said such move was tantamount to breaking the law.
He gave this directive at a two-day conference on Improved Ports Efficiency in Nigeria, organised by the Maritime Correspondents’ Organisation of Nigeria (MARCON) in Lagos at the weekend.
Amaechi further ordered freight forwarding associations to, as a matter of urgency, resolve their differences with the CRFFN.
He said the Comptroller-General of Customs has agreed to meet with him and that he might be forced to instruct the CRFFN to commence fresh registration of practitioners.
Ameachi said, “Let me talk to the customs practitioners. There is a law that you people are breaking and that law has to do with an agency in my ministry. I met with the Comptroller-General of Customs and we are starting a fresh registration of all agents. The requirement will be to register with the CRFFN before you can become a customs agent’’.
“We have agreed to meet and I will tell him that customs agents should start fresh registration because they must comply with the law,” he said.
The minister said the maritime sector was largely private sector-driven, with the government providing the appropriate policy and regulatory framework.
He added that his ministry was committed to partnering with the National Assembly to ensure that the four bills on the sector are passed into law and implemented accordingly.