CRFFN Crisis Deepens, as Estranged Board Members Move to Reclaim Council, Seek Removal of Chairman, Registrar
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*Accuse legislators, Transport Ministry of encouraging corruption in CRFFN By Francis Ugwoke
The crisis in the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) is deepening by the day with estranged members of the Governing Board of the Council calling for the sack of both the Chairman, Rtd. Col. Tsanni Abubakar and Registrar, Mr. Sam Nwakohu.
Incidentally, the elected council members according to a statement credited to Nwakohu have outlived their usefulnessin the Council, having served their full tenure of two years.
Nwakohu was alleged to have publicly declared that the tenure of the present Governing Council Members who are seeking tenure elongation through a possible amendment of the CRFFN Act has expired.
However, on the other hand, some members of the Board have attacked the Registrar and the Chairman, saying both are not qualified to be in their positions.
The aggrieved Board members are planning a mass protest to call for the removal of both the Chairman and Registrar whose appointment has since been renewed by the government.
The board members are angry that both Chairman and Registrar are planning a repeat of what happened in the era of Sir Mike Jukwe as Registrar when he remained in office for years without organising an election that brought the present board members of the Council into office.
The protest, one of the board members who is privy to the plan told SHIPPING DAY will expose allegations of huge fraud from inception till date in the Council.
The protest, according to the Board members, will be taken to the National Assembly and the Ministry of Transportation whose alleged actions according to the Council members have aided fraud in the Council.
The Board members said they have details of the budgets in the Council and projects claimed to have been executed which present physical states do not support documented claims by those running the Council.
The Board members are accusing the management of the Council of projects recycling and extravagant expenditure without considering the financial size of the Council.
The Board member also accused the National Assembly of failure to unveil the allged fraud in CRFFN during the oversight functions of the legislators and budget defence.
“The National Assembly should check the past four years budgets of the Council. The same projects are being budgeted for as against four years ago when there was claim that the projects were 90 percent completed”, one of the board members who pleaded anonymity alleged.
The board member added, “the Registrar never merited or qualified to be the Registrar of the CRFFN in the first place, but owing to the Supervisor Ministry’s lopsided interest and manouvery it sailed unhindered then. The Registrar came into the CRFFN on a political compensation and enlistment, simply put on a recommendation by the Minister through a stage managed employment application process”.
For instance, the Registrar was also accused of discrepancies in what his real age is, as he was alleged to have quoted being 59 years during job interview, while in actual fact he was 63years.
Part of the allegation against the Registrar include “. That the Registrar also lied having told the Recruitment Committee, when asked of his Professional experience with the maritime industry, he taunted to have undertaken consultancy services with the NPA.
That later findings showed there was no single trace of his engagement nor his company with the NPA.
That the Registrar continued stay in the helm of administrative affairs of the CRFFN is an outright abarretion to the Freight Forwarding Professional integrity.
The Registrar’s 4 years political appointment is a negation to the provisions of Act 16, 2007.
That, Penutmate Friday,. 27th November 2020, the political appointees representing the geopolitical zones of the Freight Forwarding in the CRFFN Governing Council were reappointed for another two years, pursuance to Section 2.. Unfortunately, the Act stated clearly in Section 2d of the CRFFN Act, that such appointment should be in rotation for two years and none of the appointees shall come from the same state within a geopolitical zones” .
Tsanni Abubakar was also not spared as he was accused of only protecting the interest of his political employers instead of the freight forwarding profession.
The board member said, “ To be frank, this our so-called Chairman abinitio, it does appear to be protecting the Interests of his political employers other than the profession and the Professionals.
This development has made us to carry out further background findings on the Chairman.
You recall the way and manner that the Chairman came into the Council though on Political consideration but a front to an internal interests. The immediate past Registrar was used to perfect his inclusion into the Register of Freight Forwarders, to enable him contest the staged managed election which we don’t have options but to participate in, thinking we are going to right the wrongs, but alas.
Then, he came intimidating the authority that he was the eye of Mr President, only for us to discover that he is the eye of a contractor with the CRFFN.
Recall also, that during Governing Council chairmanship and vice Chairman election, against the wishes of the Transport Minister , he was hand picked as the Chairman of the Governing Council”.
The board member said that the protest to the National Assembly would be to specifically demand a fresh audit of the financial records of the Council since inception to date.
He called on the National Assembly to investigate the projects in different parts of the country as claimed to have been executed by the Council in the past four years.
According to him, the freight forwarders will also be carrying out legal action against the government for cornering what ought to be for the private sector fashioned like Council of Registered Engineers in Nigeria (COREN) as a parastatal under the Ministry of Transport.
He added, “CRFFN should be like COREN. We are professionals. We will use everything at our disposal to reclaim CRFFN. We are noble men. Why are we not respected as professionasl as against what happens in COREN. We are joining forces, coming together to fight for our Council. There should be limit to politics. We shall mobilise for protests..We shall also give notice to what we want to do. The Chairman should go back to where he came from. The same for registrar. This is a profession”.
Both Chairman and Registrar could not be reached for their reactions on the allegations against them.
However, some close aides said the allegations from the aggrieved board members were as a result of the statement credited to the Registrar that their tenure has expired.
The aides wondered why the aggrieved board members kept silent all these years until the Registrar pointed out that their tenure has expired.
It would be recalled that the board members have been making frantic moves to extend their tenure which expired some months ago but this was not possible because of the coronavirus pandemic that affected activities in the National Assembly.
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