The Nigeria Customs Service has again bowed to pressure from indebted private jet owners who have failed to pay their duty to the government coffers, as it gave the debtors one more month to clear the debts.
The service disclosed this on Thursday through its spokesperson, Maiwadah Abdullahi, saying the decision was based on further consultation.
There are reports that duties are not being paid on the majority of private jets currently in the country, with the NCS seeking to recover unpaid import duties running into several billions of naira.
Following this development, the service at different times had threatened to clamp down on the defaulting private jet owners.
In 2024, Customs asked private jet owners to proceed with a verification exercise with the government. The exercise was to determine defaulters in the payment of import duty.
Recall that on October 14, 2024, The PUNCH reported that the Federal Government, through the NCS, had planned to ground over 60 private jets owned by very important persons in the country over unpaid import duty beginning from that day.
This was not implemented as the NCS later that same day announced the extension of the verification exercise for private jet owners by one month, from October 14, 2024, to November 14, 2024.
After multiple attempts to ground the affected private jets failed, the agency finally grounded over 60 private jets over their refusal to pay customs duty, an operation that lasted between Monday and Wednesday.
Following the enforcement, private jet hangars in Lagos and Abuja airports were reportedly sealed up. However, owners of the aircraft, including bank chiefs and multinational oil companies among other individuals, began to lobby the Presidency to secure the release of their jets.
Some of the grounded luxury aircraft include Bombardier BD-700 Global 6000, BD-700 Global 6500, and BD-700 Global 7500, among others. Officials of the NCS and those in the aviation sector confirmed this in separate interviews on Wednesday.
However, on Thursday, Maiwada announced the suspension of the enforcement exercise, adding that the service would again be giving a one-month window to the defaulting private jet owners.
He said, “We decided to ground aircraft, but we have done some consultations and we have a mutual understanding to suspend the action for another month so that others will come forward to comply. We know they really want to comply, it is just about regularisation and payment of customs duty.”
Meanwhile, speaking with an industry expert, Capt Muhammed Badamosi, advised the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority to remind the owners of the jets of the requirement that qualifies them to stay and operate in Nigeria.
He said, “However, the NCAA is a different body responsible for compliance with the regulations of the aviation ministry, and the NCS is another body responsible for tax collection. The NCAA can’t control the standard operating procedure for customs services.
“Since the NCAA is the first respondent to foreign-registered aircraft, they should remind them of other requirements like the Customs duty, which is independent of the regulations of the aviation regulator. If this is done from the beginning of the application process, we will not be where we are on Customs duty today. Let’s learn to do things right the first time.” (Punch)
