Customs ready to collaborate with SON to get rid of Counterfeit products

Tayo Oladipupo |

Nigeria Customs Service has expressed its readiness to cooperate with relevant agencies to flush out counterfeit products from the Nigerian markets.

The frontline revenue generating agency of the government also lauded the recent introduction of Nigerian Customs Integrated System (NICIS) 2.

The Customs Public Relations Officer (PRO) of Apapa command, Nkiru Nwala spoke with our correspondent on the side-lines of the Japan-Nigeria Anti-Counterfeit Seminar held in Lagos recently.

Nwala, a Deputy Superintendent of Customs (DSC) said that the knowledge afforded them at the workshop would enable the officers and men of the service to ask the right questions that will help the Service compliment the job of the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) in combating the menace of counterfeiting in Nigeria.

To her, such synergy is important because it will help to reduce the dangers posed by the counterfeit products infiltrating Nigerian markets.

In her words, “To start with, there is a government agency saddled with the responsibility of standards and that is SON but what we will do is that we will work with the SON and any product that has to be brought in that has to do with standards, SON will have to certify them, so we look for each importer to present the certificate from the SON.

“With the exposure now, we are not going to stop there because it is possible that somebody can beat SON, it is possible they can have a fake document but what we have learnt is that we have been given indices to look out for in various products that even when we have the certificate, we believe anyone can manipulate the system

“Those particular strategic points will guide us to identify on our own then ask other questions if we are not satisfied that such products are actually genuine.

“So, the information we got here now will specifically guide us as per things to look out for to confirm which product is of the right quality.

“The issue of counterfeiting can be detrimental to the society, we are going to collaborate with SON and this workshop today is an advantage for us to know what specifically to look out for to maintain standard for security of lives and property in Nigeria.

Speaking on the gains of NICIS 2, she said that the effect was evident in the revenue generation of Apapa command in the month of May which she said collected N4.5 billion daily.

According to her, the hues about the initial challenges the new platform experienced is not a new thing as all new things are expected to have teething problems but assured that the service is on top of the situation.

“NICIS 2 is an upgraded platform from NICIS 1 and ASSYCUDA ++ and we have already seen the effect of the new platform but there is no new thing without teething problems but there’s none that is not under control.

“Last month we talked about the command being able to generate N4.5 billion per day as a result of the NICIS 2,” she concluded.