The idea behind the creation of the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) was a noble one.
Established through an Act of Parliament in 2007, CRFFN is charged with the responsibilities of regulating and controlling the practice of freight forwarding in Nigeria and promoting the highest standards of competence, practice and conduct among members of the profession.
Eighteen years after its creation, CRFFN has remained a struggling agency, barely surviving on the life support provided by the government, thus desecrating the nobility of its birth.
Meant to be a regulatory agency independent of government control and interference as espoused by the International Federation of Freight Forwarders (FIATA), the umbrella regulatory body for the practice of freight forwarding globally, CRFFN has perpetually and permanently remained tied to the apron string of Nigerian government.
As a matter of fact, the council would have long been dead if not for the financial oxygen provided by the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy, its supervising ministry.
For close to 18 years, CRFFN has been a liability, a parasitic body whose preoccupation was more on how to survive than the performance and discharge of its statutory responsibility of regulating the freight forwarding practice in Nigeria.
The successive governing boards of the Council since inception, had been populated by people who are more concerned with their pecuniary interests, people who are more interested in their self- preservation and financial gains, than those with the burning passion to develop the struggling freight forwarding industry.
The successive acts of incompetence, the culture of lack of commitment, insincerity and corruption amongst the leadership of the council have resulted to a thick layers of rot that has stunted the growth of the body.
Largely unpopular among the freight forwarders whom it is meant to regulate due to lack of impact and efficient service delivery, CRFFN has become a puariah in the industry it is meant to superintendent over.
To shore up its internally generated revenue, the government approved the collection of Practitioners Practising Fee(POF) collectable on all cargo landed at the airports, seaports and border stations.
Under the POF regime, importer pays N3.5 per tonne of cargo imported into the country, N1.5 per kilo for air cargo, N1,000 on each imported 20- feet container and N2,000 per 40- feet container.
After the initial hiccups as a result of opposition by the disgruntled freight forwarders, the collection of the controversial POF commenced in 2021 under the leadership of the former Registrar, Samuel Nwakohu, who took over from the pioneer Registrar, Sir Mike Jukwe in 2019.
Before Nwakohu handed over to Chinyere Uromta as an Acting Registrar in January 31st, 2023, the POF was collected for three years.
The collection expectedly continued under the leadership of Uromta from January 31st,2023 to October 2024 when she was asked to hand over to the incumbent Registrar, Mr Igwe Kingsley.
Effectively, before Kingsley came on board barely two months ago, CRFFN has collected POF, reported to have run into several millions of naira, for four years.
Ironically, the Council, despite these collections,couldn’t still pay the salaries of its staff for 10 months prior to the take over of Kingsley.
The question is where did the millions of naira accrued for four years under Nwakohu and later, Uromta, go?
Obviously, the humongous amount of money collected as POF but which actually amount was shrouded in mystery, had been mismanaged and misappropriated.
Apart from few poorly coordinated training programmes organized for freight forwarders, there was no tangible means to which the POF actuals were deployed.
For the period which the Council couldn’t pay its staff, the regulatory body became a bout of laughter among the industry operators, especially the freight forwarders whom it supposed to regulate.
Its staff became restive and unrestrained, abandoned the core mandate of the council and started to hobnob with the Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria(MWUN) which eventually subsumed the council staff into its fold as one of its affiliate groups when the staff members were unionised by the labour union.
The purpose was to use the platform of the trade union to pressurize the council’s leadership to pay their accumulated salary.
When the situation became embarrassing and humiliating to the government, the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Adegboyega Oyetola, had to intervene by providing financial succour through the payment of the accumulated salary arrears in two tranches of five months each.
The last tranche was released recently shortly after the appointment of the incumbent Registrar, Mr Igwe Kingsley.
This scenario, as absurd and shameful as it was, signaled the beginning of the end of the Council, no matter the pretence among some incurable optimists.
As it stands now, the council has lost all relevance as a regulator, it has lost its dignity and prestige among the freight forwarders who the it is meant to regulate.
This sad reality was poignantly brought home after the surprise appointment of Kingsley as its Registrar.
Appointed from the fold of National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), one of the five accredited freight forwarding groups, the incumbent Registrar is obviously unpopular among the freight forwarding operators.
Presently, other accredited freight forwarding groups have rallied themselves together to challenge the appointment of the new Registrar in court.
That is why the Registrar may not be able to bring the Council from its present precipice of total descent into oblivion.
Unless the other freight forwarding groups rally their support round him, Kingsley’s tenure as the Registrar of CRFFN would be another flash in the pan, devoid of colour, character, impact and any developmental stride.
Unfortunately for the new Registrar, the present crop of staff in CRFFN have lost motivation for committed service delivery to the industry.
Their fears, which will be their major preoccupation, is for how long will the government give the council financial bail- outs to meet its obligations before the hand- outs dry up?
That is why we consider the so -called vision the Registrar purportedly has for the industry as a mere rhetorics devoid of conviction and purpose.
The tenure of Kingsley would be a defining moment in the life of CRFFN as it will either make or totally break the struggling agency.
Unless he enjoys the support of the disgruntled federating associations, no amount of financial bail -outs from government, no amount of interventions from government and no amount of vibes, vibrancy and commitment brought into the running of the council by Kingsley will save the CRFFN from taking the final plunge into the dark abyss of obsecurity.