By Amina Ojelabi
Fresh allegations of entrenched corruption have rocked the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), following claims that officials demand a ₦500,000 bribe before forwarding applications for operating licences to headquarters in Abuja.
Chief Livinus Igbo, a licensed freight forwarder, said despite meeting all statutory requirements and securing clearance from an Area Controller, his application was stalled until he was asked to pay the illegal “facilitation fee.”
“I was told to pay ₦500,000 in Abuja after my documents had already passed through the Area Controller. Without that money, they said the process would not move. I don’t have such money,” he lamented.
Corroborating the claim, Comrade Innocent Eke Okogboe, National President of the Patriot Anti-Corruption Initiative, described the demand as an entrenched racket that has long frustrated freight forwarders. He explained that while the official statutory fee for a licence remains ₦515,000, applicants are compelled to pay an additional ₦500,000 unofficially before their files are processed.
“When I visited Customs headquarters in Abuja to verify Chief Livinus’ documents, officials said they had not received them. But the Apapa Bond office confirmed they had been sent, only insisting that ₦500,000 must be paid before the file could move. After that, applicants still pay the official ₦515,000. This is outright corruption because the money goes into private pockets,” he alleged.
Okogboe noted that the practice has become so widespread that most freight forwarders reluctantly comply to avoid indefinite delays. He further criticised what he called arbitrary increases in licensing fees, claiming that Customs had raised new licence costs from ₦1.5 million to between ₦10 million and ₦20 million without clear justification.
He warned that such costs would eventually be transferred to importers and consumers, fuelling inflation and worsening Nigeria’s cost-of-living crisis. His group has since petitioned the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to investigate the matter.
The revelations come amid ongoing modernisation efforts by Comptroller-General Adewale Adeniyi, who has earned praise for pushing digitalisation and trade facilitation reforms. However, stakeholders insist that systemic corruption at the operational level continues to erode trust in the Service.
Industry operators warn that the alleged ₦500,000 bribe for licence approvals not only undermines transparency and fairness but also threatens Nigeria’s trade competitiveness under the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA).
Leave a Reply