Comrade Hassan Ibrahim, APFFLON chapter chairman for Apapa.
Story by Dili Utomi.
The many complaints about all manners of ambiguities, illegalities and deliberate actions that impinge on the smooth and effective operations within the Maritime sector of the Nigerian economy continues to echo even louder by the day.
A freight forwarder of many years of experience and the chairman of the Apapa chapter of the Africa Association of Professional Freight Forwarders and Logistics of Nigeria (APFFLON), Comrade Hassan Ibrahim is a practitioner of repute who has been in the forefront of preaching compliance at all levels, but he has had to inundate this news platform with calls about his recent experiences in the hands of members of the Nigerian Police Force.
He granted an interview which we present verbatim here.
Question: Good afternoon sir, you have been complaining about the experiences that you recently had with some members of the Nigerian Police Force, could you throw more light on it all sir?
Answer: The Nigerian Police Force especially from the Kam Salem house where the Marine Police is controlled from has always been giving us problems, but we had had to complain to the previous Assistant Inspector-General (AIG) of Police about the Police blocking our cargoes from exiting the Apapa Port after they had been cleared. The then AIG after so many complaints took a drastic action and indeed put a stop to it all, but after a couple of years, a new AIG came in and the problem of blocking cargoes has resurfaced. They started sending letters to the shipping companies to stop containers from moving out of the Ports again.
Question: Sir, do you have any specific example to buttress this point that you just made?
Answer: Yes, I do personally have such an experience. I had a cargo cleared from the Apapa Port and subsequently went to the shipping company to have it released, but on getting there, I was told by their worker that the Police from under the command of the AIG at the Kam Salem house has sent them a letter detailing them not to release my container with the usual extortionist language of “we suspect the contents of the cargoes and the conspiracy that may have occurred while clearing the container”, so the container was not released to me.
This is the usual language being used when they want to carry out their extortionist act. We wrote the Police to ask why our cargo has been blocked and they asked us to get a copy of the letter blocking the container from the shipping company. The shipping company refused to give us the letter, but agreed to give us the reference number of the Police letter, which they did. We took the reference number of the letter to the Police and they admitted that they were the ones that placed the blockage on the cargoes and they asked us for money before the container movement could be unblocked.
The reference number of the letter that the Nigerian Police Force wrote to the shipping company for the container to be blocked is Police LA/CID/B/21 of 04/03/25 and the container number is ZCSU7617503. When we got back to the Police at Kam Salem house, they through one Tunde requested for the sum of Two Hundred Thousand (₦200,000.00) Naira before they could write the letter unblocking the container’s movement out of the Port. We protested and requested that the container be re-examined with the Police present at the spot, but they refused. Our protest that this is tantamount to economic sabotage fell on deaf ears and in the end, we were forced to part with the sum of One Hundred and Fifty Thousand (₦150,000.00) naira before the letter was written and our cargo released. What we found out was that the Police collaborates with the shipping companies to perpetuate this type of fraud all the time, both sides make money from this illegal act.
Question: Sir, you are the Apapa chapter chairman of APFFLON. What are the steps that you have take as an association to forestall this type of illegality?
Answer: Normally, when a new AIG is appointed, we usually visit with the mindset of cooperating to make the business environment better, we did the same thing when this new AIG was freshly appointed. Though, I can say that the new AIG had ordered the rank and file to take to the dictates of the law, but we have not really witnessed that rule being obeyed as I just narrated my personal experience to you, other Freight Forwarders also have their terrible experiences to narrate.
The Police does not have the authority to block cargoes, that is the function of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council whenever any foul play is suspected, but the Police do this now because of what they as individuals stand to gain and that is only the pecuniary gains, this is done not minding the damage being done to the Nigerian economy.
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