My Journey Through Customs and How We Contribute to Lekki Port’s Growth – Olumoh, Retired Controller
In this special interview, Comptroller Olanrewaju Olumoh , outgoing Customs Area Controller of Lagos Free Trade Zone Command spoke with journalists, few days to his exit from service.
He recalled his thirty five year with nostalgia and how he has fared as the Controller of Customs at the nation’s most modern and fastest port facility in Lekki.
Olumoh who oversaw the operations of fifteen free trade zones under his command in addition to the Lekki Deep-sea Port maintained an average of ₦70b monthly collections between January and August 2024.Under him, what was recorded as annual collection in 2023 has been sustained as monthly collection in 2025.
He struck a balance of robust stakeholders engagement while addressing the various peculiarities about the free zones
He spoke with Ismail Aniemu
Excerpt
Tell us about you experience in service in the last 35 years especially from the less digital period with this era of modernisation
To start with, in those early days in the service, there was the long room. I remember when I was in Apapa , I was a striker.We did a lot of things manually, like the cargo clearance. But today, there is a lot of modernization and automation is on just like the NICIS and the most recent Unified Customs Management System, also known as B’Odogwu platform, which makes cargo clearance more speedy, transparent and efficient. That is quite a lot in terms of modernization. The service has undergone an appreciable level of modernization, which is far from what it was in those days.
Again, we have witnessed a stronger emphasis on capacity building with improved trading opportunities. Many today have been exposed to trading both locally and internationally.
There is an opportunity to interact with your counterparts in other customs administrations worldwide.We are experiencing global best practices. Coming back here, we see the need and we have a duty to put that in practice . The mandate of the service has gone beyond revenue collection and anti-smuggling. Today, trade facilitation is a key component. We are very much involved in stakeholder engagement and collaboration with other partners .
How have I adapted to all these evolving changes? One aspect is in the area of continuous learning. We do that a lot because we now see the need to be attuned for whatever we do to be in tandem with what is going on in other places. So far, the journey has been a very incredible one. I am very proud and grateful for having this opportunity to make my little contribution to national development.
As one who has worked in other ports, coming to now work in Nigeria’s fastest growing deep seaport, walk us through your experience here comparatively.
Well, I’m privileged to have been here since April last year and it’s a great privilege. Lekki is the first automated seaport in the country. The facilities we have in the deep seaport are top-notch.You can’t see many of these facilities elsewhere in Nigeria. It’s the same with our free trade zones. It has been a privilege for me overseeing the rapid transformation of this command.
A lot of credit goes to my predecessors. They have done a lot which I was privileged to come and build upon. We have a very robust relationship with our stakeholders in the port and in the free zones. I’ve made myself very accessible to them and that has helped us a lot because through that, we have been able to listen to their concerns, address them and see that they are thriving. When they are thriving, it will reflect in our own revenue as well.
It’s the same thing in the port. The port is just two years old now and today, it’s one of the fastest-growing port and a major hub, not just for the country, but even other sub-regional economies.
Working here has earned me a wonderful experience and technology has helped us.Just like I said about the automation that we have ,the seaport is also very automated. Everything is moving on very well. It has been a very great experience.
Your operational ecosystem comprises of public, private sector stakeholders and people of international interest. How do you strike a balance with these various stakeholders and achieve the goal of your service?
We appreciate the fact that our reason for being here is to provide an enabling environment for these facilities to flourish. As much as possible, we know the vision the government has, and we have aligned ourselves with that vision to make the place very conducive to all legitimate operators.
We make sure Customs is very much available to provide the best support to
whoever has legitimate interest to do business here and we have made our stakeholders to realize that. We are here to ensure compliance with the import and export regulations, to see that Nigeria is not a dumping ground through bringing unwholesome products here and to ensure that maximum revenue is generated for the government.
At the same time, we make the place very conducive and business friendly. If there are challenges, we are available to solve them. Our stakeholders that I said we are having a very robust relationship with have seen that. They’ve seen that sincerity of purpose in what we are doing. For example, the level of engagements that we have been having with our stakeholders on the B’Odogwu platform is very remarkable. Apart from having them around, and sensitizing them here, we still take sensitization to their various places.
We have 15 different free zones and we went to each of them. Perhaps there are certain concerns a zone might probably have that they would not want to bring to the open where other free zones are.We focus on each free zone and by that, all our stakeholders have been very appreciative of our efforts. We’ve been able to strike a balance between the private and government interests because at the end of the day, it’s mutual.
It is when you have the right climate to operate that you flourish. That is when government can get appropriate revenue from us. Ultimately, it is in the larger interest of the country and everyone.
What does it mean to be a Customs officer ? How has being a Customs officer affected you as a person in terms of discipline, the way you relate to your family and all of that? How has it affected you positively?
The beauty of being a Customs officer is being disciplined. This is an organization where discipline is expected of everyone. A Customs officer should have integrity , should be disciplined, upright and know that he or she is in a position of trust. He or she is in a vantage position where national interest, both in terms of revenue and security are paramount.
As a Customs officer, I see myself as having a unique privilege to serve the country.I should see that anything injurious to the lives of millions of Nigerians would not pass through me.
Tell us about your most memorable and most challenging moments as a customs officer and give us an idea of how you managed through those moments.
I think one I can recall was when I was in Kebbi State years back and I had patrol teams.There was an incident in which one of my officers took an hasty action, which was pursuing a suspected smuggler which resulted in an accident and the villagers were enraged. When I heard about it ,I was troubled. I had always been mindful of having good relationship with the community.
When that happened, I quickly reached out to the traditional ruler of the place who I had a warm relationship with. They quickly made sure calmness was restored to the community. Thankfully, no life was lost but I realized that having good relationship with host communities would always help in moments like that.
In terms of achievement, I think during this last chapter of my career, which interestingly is here in the Lagos Free Trade Zone Command, as the Customs Area Controller, there has been a remarkable progress we made in terms of revenue generation because it is quite surprising that despite the challenging economy, we are able to record a groundbreaking revenue here. I’m so happy that we’ve been able to attract a lot of investors to our free trade zones.
Most times, investors come around. The terminal operators and the shipping management always come around to this Command . I always let them know that this is a place where they will never have a cause to regret their decision to make Nigeria their destination for investment. For this reason , they’ve been able to attract more of their like minds from other parts of the country.It is something I’m so happy about.It is the same thing with our seaport as it has grown, and it keeps growing.
You’ve spent 35 years in service and that’s a lot. What will be your advice for young officers?
I’ll advise them to remain upright, to uphold the law and to be mindful of not doing anything that would contravene the laws of the service and the laws of the land. They should not buy into the negative mindset of getting rich quick.They should be patient, professional and diligent in their business and the sky will be their limit. There are still very bright prospects in the service.
Traders are imperfect, like humans, normally. I want you to give us an insight into the level of integrity and compliance of traders within this zone on a scale of 0 to 100.
Perfection belongs to God, but I must say , with every sense of responsibility that if you’re talking of compliance, this command is a leading example. In our free zones, they are very compliant, both in what they are taking out of the country ,in documentations and whatever they are expected to pay, perhaps they have one error or the other.Whenever we explain to them, they correct it . They do not make those mistakes deliberately .It’s the same thing with our seaports. With the level of automation that is on in the Lekki Deep Seaport, non-compliance is quite difficult to practice.I’ll say the level of compliance here is very high because right from day one, we have set things right.
We know that in any space where we have good players, there are bad players too, but I let everybody realize that I am interested in the good players. Once you are involved in a legitimate business , it is our duty to see that everything moves on well.
The Authorised Economic Operator (AEO) has been very helpful to us.There was a time, when some bad ones brought in some bad shipments, including drugs and they wanted to test our vigilance through intels as a lot of these things are intelligence-driven.
We’ve been tracking them, our Customs Intelligence Unit (CIU) are top-notch.We collaborate with other agencies because Customs cannot do it alone. We have a good synergy here.
We were able to intercept those containers of Tramadol. We have the best scanning machines in the country here in Lekki port and we scan hundreds of containers within minutes.That will tell us if there are questionable shipments.
I want to know what you do to relax as a human being.Tell us about yourself outside of customs. Can you tell us how you unwind?
I’m not a social recluse. I do games, squash, scrabble, and all that.I do that with my family and the community. I am very much involved in my community and with my my old school association.
We can’t be talking about business, reporting, without looking at figures , analysis and analytics. Concerning revenue generation, what has the Command achieved from January to August 2025 compared to the same period in 2024 percentage-wise.For your target this year, what have you attained?
The command has recorded a very wonderful progress in revenue generation. There’s a phenomenal increase in our revenue generation. Let’s start with 2023.The command realized N74 billion at the end of the year 2023. I came to this command in April 2024 and at the end of the year, it reached N341 billion.From January to August, we are already at N459 billion.We now make what we made yearly in 2023 on monthly basis in 2025.
That is why we are doing everything possible to encourage and attract people to use this port. By the special grace of God, my successor will raise the bar. The command has a very bright prospect.Talking of percentage, we have surpassed what we had last year by over 20 percent as at August. We still have four months to go and God will help us.
Give us a brief insight into post-retirement life. Your immediate, medium, and long-term post-retirement life.
Once again, all thanks to the Almighty God for preserving me throughout this 35 years journey. Getting to this level is an unusual blessing. I hope that when I retire, I will have more time with my family. I will also be more involved in education.I will possibly venture into lecturing in the area of Human Capital Development. I will continue to provide service in another phase to my community. I will add some value to other associations I belong to. I am looking back to my years in Customs with a lot of gratitude to God.
I am most grateful to the CGC and my great country, Nigeria for this opportunity to be of service. I also thank all the stakeholders for the support throughout my working period here.
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