The Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Bashir Adeniyi has said that the Service does not fix rates for custom payment, and as such the fluctuations in import duty rates over the past few months cannot be attributed to the Service.
Adeniyi disclosed this during an interview session on Arise TV when asked why the exchange rate quotation for imported goods increased twice over the past six months.
The Comptroller General noted that the merger of various sectors of the forex market by the current administration has had repercussions on how Customs conducted its operations as it could no longer use rates independently unless specified through the merged windows.
- “The new administration has not made any pretension towards the fact that it was going to take several bold decisions and reforms aimed at repositioning the Nigerian economy and bringing sustainable change over a long period.
- “One of the reforms that have been undertaken is the merger of the various sectors of the forex market.
- “This has repercussions on our operations. What it means is that we can’t use independently that are not specified through these merged windows.
- “What we do is just to update our system and follow what is prescribed for us by the regulatory authority for monetary affairs, which is the Central Bank of Nigeria,” the CG explained.
What you should know
- When President Bola Tinubu assumed the position of the president of Nigeria following his victory in the 2023 general elections, he promised several economic reforms to reposition the economy.
- About seven months ago, Nairametrics reported that the Central Bank of Nigeria announced the unification of the forex market.
- The unification of the forex market implied the merging of all segments of the forex market into a single window – the Investors and Exports (I&E) window, where market forces will determine the exchange rate.
It’s now fairly obvious there’s not much of a market force in the Nigerian forex market since the government has remained the dominant fx earner and supplier while the private sector has remained the major fx buyer. Hence, it’s more of a one-way traffic and as such the battering of the naira and associated high import duties and price inflation may continue unfettered.