The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has blamed the exclusion of some items from foreign exchange (forex) transactions by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for its dwindling revenue generation profile.
The Apapa Area 1 Command of the NCS yesterday, announced a dip in its monthly revenue collection for September. The Command said it collected N23.3 billion as revenue in September, far below the N30.1 billion collected in August, according to a report signed by its Area Controller, Comptroller Eporwei Edike.
The N7billion decline was blamed on the exclusion of some items from foreign exchange transactions by the CBN.
The apex bank in July published a list of items for which forex will no longer be sourced from the banking system.
The list included rice, cement, clothes, textiles, toothpick, poultry products, meat and processed meat, margarine, palm kernel/palm oil and vegetable oils, private airplanes/jets, tinned fish, incense and wooden doors. Others are soaps and cosmetics, tomato/tomato paste, woven fabrics, table ware, kitchen utensils, furniture, plywood boards and panels, wood particle boards and panels, and glassware. Cold rolled steel sheets, galvanised steel sheets, wire mesh and steel nails were also on the list.
Apapa Customs revenue collection showed that N12.6 billion went into the Federation Account in September, comprising import duty, fees and Common External Tariffs (CET).
Under the Non-Federation Account, the command generated N10.7 billion from five per cent Value Added Tax (VAT); seven per cent Port Levy, and 0.5 per cent Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Trade Liberalisation Scheme (ETLS).