Freight Forwarder tackles NAFDAC over allegation against NAGAFF

Chinazor Megbolu |

The National Vice President, National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), Dr. Segun Musa has taken strong exception to the attack on his association by the National Agency for Food Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) .

It would be recalled that NAFDAC has accused NAGAFF and other members of the freight forwarding confraternity of cheating and manipulating clearance documents for fraudulent purposes.

The regulatory agency was reacting to the allegation of sleaze in sample examination levelled against its officials by the association’s Compliance team.

However, Musa expressed his reservations over the allegation of professional impropriety levelled against NAGAFF and others freight forwarders. He noted that it was rather unfortunate that an organisation like NAFDAC would be casting aspersions on freight forwarders.

According to Musa; “I think it is right time we constructively engage the government to devise a methodological approach that would ensure all transactions with this questionable agencies are done online as we are not interested in any physical interaction that could encourage unethical conducts.

“The Director General of NAFDAC should be more concerned with how all her staff became multimillionaires overnight with the federal government salary structure rather than chasing shadows.

“If she claimed to be a saint, let her invite Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate her agency by declaring assets to know how stinking her agency is with corruption.

“The DG heading agency like NAFDAC should be busy sanitising her agency instead of casting aspersions on professionals”.

The NAFDAC, you will recall , last Sunday, accused freight forwarders operating within the sea, air and land borders of forging and doctoring of documents.

The Director-General, NAFDAC, Professor Mojisola Adeyeye made the allegation in a statement made available to our Correspondent in reaction to a news item credited to the NAGAFF.

The National Coordinator of 100 per cent compliance team of NAGAFF, Alhaji Ibrahim Tanko, also accused NAFDAC and one other agency of indiscriminate and excessive collection of sample materials at the ports. He added that the sample materials were not always returned after conducting tests on them.

Tanko had reiterated that the compliance team would focus its attention on such anomaly in the new year, saying importers have been burdened by the illegal practice.

In her response, the Director General of NAFDAC through the Director of Ports Inspection, Prof. Samson B. Adebayo, called on importers to initiate clearing processes themselves rather than asking their agents to do that because even when they have genuine and complete documents, for whatever reasons, some clearing agents still submit forged documents.