The internal crisis rocking the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) came to a head recently when the executives of the association suspended some prominent members including the Board of Trustees Chairman, Taiwo Mustapha and a former National President, Chief Ernest Elochukwu. ANLCA Deputy National President, Prince Kayode Farinto, in this interview admits that the crisis is taking a toll on the association. He also blames some unidentified Customs officers for fanning the embers of discords within the fold of the association.
It appears ANLCA is embroiled in crisis. How did the association get to this boiling point?
Let me start like this. During our swearing-in sometimes in April 2018, we noticed that there was division amongst members of the Board of Trustees. The Board of Trustees of ANLCA comprises nine members but Tony Iju pulled out of the board to contest for the position of National President which he won. This led to a big row where the board began to see the National Executive Council (NECOM) as partisan. Then we also discovered that some board members were not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC). Investigating further, we learned that one of them was given money to register members of the board but he never did. So, this became a very big problem where one of the board members saw that there was going to be a coup and he went to court. After this, we found out that only three board members were registered out of the eight members; Chief Peter Obi, Prince Taiwo Oyeniyi and Chief Henry Njoku. Knowing this, we said that NECOM should not recognize the other five members pursuant to a court judgment which says we should not recognize them.
This metamorphosed to another level and when it was getting out of hand, the new board members then went to CAC for registration. They registered and told us that since they registered at the twilight of the administration, their tenure starts from that day of registration which is not so according to a part of the CAMA (Company and Allied Matters Act) 2020 as amended. So, out of the eight members remaining,, three members supported Tony Iju who won the election while the other five members supported his opponent who lost the election. This led to the polarization of the board along two factions: factions A and B. Faction B members being the majority then sought to remove the chairman because he was among the minority. The chairman was among the first three members while the secretary was produced from the remaining five members. So, they were now agitating for an extension of their tenure knowing fully well that their tenure was about six month to its conclusion. So, Tony Iju said they should conduct an election but not on the eve of our inauguration. This is because they wanted to conduct a kangaroo election and this was the real reason behind the crisis. Also, tribal sentiments came in for administrative convenience and we handled it by recognizing tribal balance in the positioning of leadership in the association.
The Tony Iju-led executives recently expelled some very senior members of the association like Chief Ernest Elochukwu, who is a former National President of ANLCA, and seven others. Isn’t this action taking the matter too far? Won’t this lead to a disintegration of ANLCA?
There is nothing like disintegration. What we want to achieve in ANLCA is discipline and if we can get about thirty members who would be disciplined, cultured and civilized, so be it. We do not want people who do not respect the constitution or see themselves as moneybags; hence they should not be penalized when they run afoul of the constitution.
That era is gone. Whatever we do now, we do according to the tenets of the constitution. The constitution empowered the National Disciplinary Committee to look into any misdemeanor by any of our members. The National Disciplinary Committee wrote about six letters to the expelled members informing them of the opportunity to come and defend themselves. While some came, others did not. I was privileged to be the chairman of that committee. We looked for circumstantial evidences against them and when they were found guilty, they were expelled. It is just like when we say we have a BOT of PDP and a member flouts the law against the president, he or she will be dealt with. Our committee recommended that they should be suspended but when we got to the National Executive Committee (NEC); NEC looked at the grievous offences they had committed and said they should be expelled. So, nobody is above suspension and none is indispensable. It is an expulsion but if they want to come back, they know what to do.
You and other national officers of the association have been accused of disobeying two court orders. Aren’t you afraid of being remanded for contempt?
Which court order did we disobey? There was a court order that we should not recognize the expelled members. Meanwhile, they brought a certificate from CAC alongside an injunction, which states that we should recognize them since they have registered. We then wrote to CAC to verify the authenticity of the certificate but they replied that the so-called certificate was issued in error. There is another court ruling, which says that if we continue to recognize them as Board of Trustees members, we will go to jail. Mind you, an injunction has a life span while a court order does not. If you look at CAMA Act 2020 as amended, the power of the board is clearly stipulated there. The board has advisory role to play; not executive powers to suspend the association’s president. The constitution also stated the power of the president who is the chief executive officer. Where did they derive that power to suspend the president? They do not have the powers to suspend him. We went to school. We are not in a banana republic where somebody can take the law into their hands. They have been expelled and they remain expelled. I still don’t know where they derived their powers from.
The Taiwo Mustapha-led Board of Trustees also alleged that you organized some thugs to cart away some office equipment at the association’s secretariat, which led to the arrest of Chief Ernest Elochukwu, Prince Taiye Oyeniyi and others. How true is this?
They were the ones that even organized boys to come and kill us at the secretariat. I was privileged to be at the secretariat that day, I was the one that called the police. We arrested one of their boys that the police arraigned before the court. The BOT members were the ones that bailed the boy in court with guns. We have the evidences at the secretariat. That is even why NEC said they should be expelled. It was only God that saved us that day.
Why has reconciliation been difficult? Why have you been avoiding reconciliatory meetings with your aggrieved members?
I’m not aware of any reconciliation call except for one where the expelled members reported us to SARS (the now defunct police special anti-robbery squad) as gun- runners. We were arrested – the president, the national secretary and I. At the conclusion of their activities, SARS attempted to have a reconciliation meeting with us. We attended the meeting, which took place twice. The expelled board members gave their conditions and we gave ours.
After that, they saw that they could not meet up with our conditions so they never called any other meeting again. We know that in politics, it is give and take. We wanted them to agree with some of our conditions but they refused. Dr Rafiu Oladipo who called me now is the only one that has been disturbing us for reconciliation and he just came back from abroad. He said he would call me today for a meeting and as you can see, he just did now. There was no reconciliation that was called that we never attended. These people believe in their crooked ways of running the organization. They cut corners but we are different.
