Seaport terminal operators under the umbrella of Sea Port Terminal Operators Association of Nigeria (STOAN) have, once again, hatched a secret plot to increase storage charges on imported items across the country arbitrarily without consultation with the relevant stakeholders in the nation’s maritime business sector, the Association of Concerned Freight Forwarders and Transporters (ACFF&T) in Nigeria has alleged.
The body of freight forwarders in Nigeria also alleged that even though almost all STOAN members lack the needed number of trucks to convey cargoes to the scanner site for examination in the ports across the country, which is delaying the clearing process and impeding ease of doing business in the ports, STOAN has cooked up destructive storage charges that are about to wreak havoc on Nigerian economy through high cost of living and inflation if the charges are implemented.
Forwarder Ndubisi Uzoegbo, the national Vice Chairman of ACFF&T who spoke to journalists in Lagos on behalf of the national Chairman, Andy Omenogor, on Thursday, October 12, 2023, accused STOAN of having concluded the plot to raise storage charges in the respective terminals from the N15,000 to over N90,000 after the initial three days grace without notifying the Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) which is a body that regulates shipping activities in the country. Uzoegbo said some STOAN members have already begun to ask shippers and freight forwarders for the new payment without prior notification. He also said that the new charges have begun to bring about port congestion as many freight forwarders and importers have abandoned their cargoes in the ports.
To worsen the situation, ACFF&T accused STOAN members of having deployed their Media Consultant, Mr Bolaji Akinola to allegedly induce members of the maritime media with huge sums of money to cause journalists in the sector to refuse to report the story of terminal and storage charges increase because making such public could affect the already soiled image of STOAN negativity.
Uzoegbo said: “The authorities should mandate terminal operators and shipping companies to allow a grace period of 90 days for owners of cargoes already at the ports and all concluded contracts entered under the old charges to take delivery of their consignment”.
A freight forwarder, Dr Fred Ajuzie, specifically accused the AP Moller Container Terminals Limited (APMT) Apapa of deliberately reducing the number of its trucks that convey containers to the scanner site in order to accrue demurrage from cargoes and make more profit to the detriment of the Nigerian people and its economy. Ajuzie said that lack of trucks to convey containers to the scanner delays clearing processes and impede the Federal Government ease of doing business policy.
Ajuzie: “The scanner in Apapa Port is one, its capacity is about 400 containers per day, but right now it can scan only about 120 containers a day which means the scanner could not operate at full capacity. And the APMT cannot do anything to bring more trucks because it has not enough trucks to move containers to the scanner.
“And why APMT is doing that is deliberate, it’s their administrative strategy to make more money, because the more days containers remain in their terminal, the more money they generate through demurrage, it’s an artificial thing.
“APMT doesn’t move all the containers to the scanner in order to make more money. It is APMT wickedness and the wickedness of the operators not to move containers to the scanner in order to make more money.
“Clearing agents and the business community are now the ones suffering this deliberate wickedness”.
