INTERVIEW: Comptroller Abubakar Zurmi is Incorruptible, Honesty Personified – Ahmad Rabiu, MD Dala Dry Port
Ahmad Rabiu, Managing Director of Kano based Dala Inland Dry Port spoke to Ismail Aniemu on the sidelines of a reception to celebrate winner of Nigeria Customs Service Controller of the Year, Comptroller Dalhatu Abubakar Zurmi.
Zurmi’s activities, according to Rabiu helped in saving cost and time.
(Q) What is your assessment of customs operations since Comptroller Dalhatu Abubakar Zurmi assumed office here,ten months ago?
We have had so many changes within a short period. Immediately he reported, he arranged for an engagement with all stakeholders, he announced his arrival and told us his mission. Especially on the brief or the guidance that has been handed over to him by the Comptroller General of Customs Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, on account of which he said his principal’s priority is to do whatever it takes to facilitate legitimate trade.
He said he needed our cooperation and he needed us to understand how the customs procedures are supposed to be properly implemented. What he was calling for was strict compliance with customs rules, policies, and regulations. He was ready, with the effort given to him by his boss, to facilitate anything that is required to make import and export operations seamless.
He constituted a compliance team, and once you talk of compliance, you are talking of something that is unpopular to other stakeholders except the government agencies because we are going to be required to pay duties and to follow all required procedures.
He sensitized us on our rights, duties and obligations and updated our knowledge on the dos and donts of our trade.
According to him, everybody will be happy and it becomes a win-win situation. With that arrangement, every day that there is any issue regarding compliance, he does not address only the directly affected terminal , broker , agent or importer. He calls all of us, the associations, some critical individuals and those affected by anything that may have happened at that time. So every case study was an opportunity to gain knowledge and improve on compliance
He talks about the infractions that have happened, the ways to avoid them and the remedy .Then he explains how to go through every procedures and so he keeps doing that. Initially we were not happy. No stakeholder was happy because nobody wants to follow procedure.
As you know, that is part of our culture and attitude in the country but the glory of God, he has come to convince us that if you follow the procedure, at the end, you will save cost , suffer less and regret or fear nothing because you have already done what you ought to have done according to the law. .
His coming has brought to the table a very clear commitment of an officer that is a dutiful, who insists on playing by the rules and has always been accessible to address us anytime we need his attention.
He has made things to happen with ease for all stakeholders, not only the terminal or customs agents but also for the importers or exporters or the bankers or whoever. Even on transporting, he has done everything that has made the environment sanitized and that has began to really return us to the days of glory where the trade volume keeps increasing every day.
On account of enforcement, he was able to deal with matters of money laundering. He does not believe in bribery even at the verge of his retirement . If he were some people,he would have just taken some settlement and nobody would hear what has happened, but no, he enforced the law and did not get bribe or whatever from anybody on money laundering .
On account of that, he got the third award, which is the best in revenue generation. So compliance, enforcement and revenue generation, are together in the same cycle.He is incorruptible. He is honesty personified
As long as one happens, the other is likely going to follow and the issue of public relations is what I have understood by what he did the first day he came to us. The first thing he did was call all of us and talk to us and then he enlisted our support and said, if we have anything that we need to talk about, we should talk to him .He said we should talk to him if we were wrong .
Finally, you know, when you go into the Kano/Jigawa Area Command, Nigeria Customs Service, the moment you enter the compound and you want to see him, I assure you to ask anybody. He is just going to be there for you and luckily for him, he has also been blessed with persons he can trust because most of his deputies and other officers are approachable.
By virtue of the way they operate, they give us the comfort that they are working with their boss and they are all committed to making the Kano/Jigawa Command the best and to the glory of God, he has not spent a year yet, but he has earned the commendation of the CGC and has been honoured as the best Customs Controller in Nigeria.
(Q) I want you to tell us in specific terms, how did all this benefit the Dala Inland Dry Port?
Well, I founded Dala Dry Port about 25 years ago . When I founded it, my hope was that it was going to be the hub and the mother ports to open the terminals around, because we do not have a seaport.
One of the terminals that is around Kano is in the neighbourhood, within the Kano/Jigawa Command. These activities of enforcement are the major issues of coordination.
There is the PR issue, that is educating and persuading the public on how to do it right. These are things that have benefited us greatly.
We are already improving in enquiries and also in volume and we believe that his coming has been a great blessing to Dala Inland Dry Port, the bonded terminals, the customs agents, importers and exporters and the entire Kano business community.
We are happy that God gave him the opportunity in his closing hours of service because of this age limit of 30 and the ordinary 35 years of continuous service. We are hopeful that those coming behind or taking over will do the same or even better, in order to sustain the tempo and to make Kano the place of glory as a transparent trade hub.
We are also doing critical studies to ensure that Kano/Jigawa Command, with the homongous investment that we have done there, is able to achieve or we are able to actualize the status of origin and destination so that anybody exporting from around the area, once the cargo comes into the Dala Inland Dry Port, the journey has begun and they don’t need to panic.
As a dry port, customs efficiency affects us directly. We saved time during our interaction with customs and time is money. We also saw a more transparent way of operation through him.
(Q) Specifically, what is your advice for junior customs officers presently working under him, and any area controller that will take over from him?
The most important thing at retirement age is for you to retire with glory and to the glory of God, Alhaji Abubakar Zurmi, has been blessed with that opportunity of retiring with glory because what has happened in the last week, when the CGC conferred him with an award, is a great honor to him and to us
His family members are very happy and very proud of him. What I want to tell the junior officers and other officers working with him is that it is very important they do their jobs truthfully.Do it right, and at the end of it, you’ll be honored.
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