‘Functional Scanner Prerequisite for 24-Hour Port Operations’

For the federal government to achieve the 24 hours port operations mandate issued as part of the Ease of Doing Business Executive Order recently signed by the acting President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, the scanners at the nation’s ports must be kept functional, Group Executive Vice Chairman, SIFAX Group, Dr. Taiwo Afolabi has said.

Afolabi said in a statement that the poor state of the scanners in most ports across the country makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to discharge its duty of container inspection effectively. “Most scanners at our ports are either completely broken down or functioning well below installed capacity. This has left the personnel of the NCS with no other option than to do 100 per cent physical examination of cargoes. This comes with huge difficulties and impedes quality and efficient service delivery that the Ease of Doing Business executive order is trying to address,” he said.

In order to address the problem of faulty scanners, Afolabi urged the federal government to consider the option of concession as the current economic reality in the country has made it impracticable for the government alone to shoulder the responsibility of infrastructure provision in critical sectors of the economy.

“The model of concession is already a success in the maritime sector. The last 11 years of private sector involvement in port terminal management has brought great improvement to service delivery. I am convinced that such feat could be extended to the scanning service if the federal government gives private investors the opportunity of managing the process,” he said.

Aside the improvement in service delivery, Afolabi also noted that functional scanners at the ports are necessary for national security in view of the recent cases of illegal arms importation through the nation’s sea ports. He argued that such illegal importation would have been discovered during cargo examination with the aid of functional scanners.