Toju Vincent 11 September 2013, Lagos – Nigeria’s Federal government is planning to computerise export of its oil to ensure transparency in the export of the product and to earn increased income therefrom.
Mr. Muktar Ahmed, Managing Director of Web Fontain, who revealed this, stated that his firm has proposed to the government to apply the same modernisation process that has been in the Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, and by extension, the Nigeria port industry.
According to him,his company was contracted to carry out the modernisation of the Customs service about seven and half years ago, adding that the Customs is better positioned to deal with its trading publics.
Ahmed said both Web Fontain and the Customs together with the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, are talking with the relevant government agencies and their response has been very receptive.
“What I did mention was that we have seen the impact, positive impact that we have with the issue of import and I do not think that we still have agent and importers doing business in the port using the manual process, everything is now done electronically,” he stated.
He said: “From the point your manifest is submitted up to the point that RAR is issued, form ‘M’ is electronic, payment is electronic, and releasing is electronic. So from end to end, for the import transaction, it has been automated. So, we are advising government to go ahead to do the same thing with export and the country will benefit from it”.