Moses Ofodeme
The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), has said that its online application portal for the operation of the offshore Conformity Assessment Programme (SONCAP) is effectively operational.
Mr Bola Fashina, Head, Public Relations of SON, said this in a statement issued on Wednesday in Lagos, while reacting to the allegations by some importers that the portal had collapsed.
He said that the application portal was for the processing of its regulated imports into Nigeria.
Fashina said the portal was recently upgraded to ensure optimal performance, enhance a seamless operation and facilitate more efficient service delivery to customers and stakeholders alike.
According to him, the upgraded SONCAP portal offers a one-stop shop that provides clients with opportunity to apply, track application, send messages to SON and receive responses as well as upload evidence of payments seamlessly.
He said that it was the profile of the work done and documents used for application that were available on Clients’ dashboard, while also eliminating Tax Identification Number (TIN) error and mistakes in company name.
Fashina said that a recent challenge in transmitting approved and activated SONCAP certificates to the national trade portal was not peculiar to SON, but all other trade- related agencies from January 22.
He said the issue had since been rectified on the national trade portal and all pending SONCAP certificates had been transmitted to the Nigerian Integrated Customs Information System (NICIS) portal, as at February 1.
On the claim that imports were accumulating demurrage as a result of the gap, Fashina explained that the SONCAP was a pre-shipment process.
He said that only non-compliant importers who apply for the certificates after the arrival of their consignments were the ones affected by the development.
Fashina alleged that some importers who brought in about 182 containers into the country without following the pre-shipment conformity assessment process were those trying to circumvent established procedure and crying wolf.
According to him, such consignments will naturally be subjected to scrutiny and seized if found to be substandard, while those behind them would face prosecution.
He advised importers to follow the import procedures strictly by ensuring that they process their products and SONCAP certificates offshore, rather than looking for short cuts after the consignments had arrived Nigeria.
Meanwhile, the Standards Organization of Nigeria (SON) has destroyed substandard mobile phone accessories worth N480 million.
Director-General, Osita Aboloma, made this known at the destruction of the accessories in Epe, Lagos, on Tuesday.
Aboloma, represented by Director, Inspectorate, Compliance and Directorate of SON, Mr Obiora Manafa, explained that the organization was on top of its game to ensure that substandard goods did not find their ways into the Nigerian markets.
He explained that the mobile phone accessories were seized by SON for not meeting up with the required standards.
Aboloma said the move was to serve as deterrent to unscrupulous importers who indulged in illicit trade to short-change unsuspecting consumers of their hard-earned money spent purchasing these goods.
The SON director-general stressed that the safety of lives and property of Nigerians was of great importance to the organization.
“We are here today to destroy some products that are dangerous, and we do not want them to enter the markets.
“They are mobile phone accessories and they are fake, the major brands such as Samsung, Techno, Infinix, Huawei and lots of others. We seized these items late last year.
“We seized them from a commercial warehouse in Lagos, but the products are not owned by the owner of the warehouse.
“We subjected these products to laboratory analysis and they all failed,” he said.
According to him, importers of the substandard mobile accessories have committed an offence by faking these known brands.
Aboloma said that the negative impact on the investment of the original brand owners was huge.
“First, they have contravened the law of the country. They faked known brands and when we showed these products to the original brand owners, they denied ownership which means that they are fake brands.
“We also went further to do the analysis and they all failed the test. We are also looking at these accessories from two aspects which include the economic and safety points of view.
“The economic point is that the accessories you buy will not last more than a week, and this to us, do not make economic sense, because you do not get value for the money spent.
“The safety aspect is that these accessories pose serious threat to the users. When we tested the insulation parameters of these products, they all failed woefully.
“The IEC standards of power states that the minimum power you get from these products should be 1000 mega ohms, but the values we got after testing gave only 60 mega ohms.
“So, it is as bad as using naked wires, because it is not preventing any flow of current, exposing the users to electric shocks and can even burn houses,” he added.
Aboloma noted that SON could not allow these products to enter the Nigerian market, saying the products were destroyed after obtaining a court order.
“These products are valued over N480 million. We are not happy burning these products because it is a loss to owners.
“The owners have spent so much money to import these products and the whole investment is going into flames.
“It is even a drain on the national economy and nobody is happy about that, but we have our primary responsibility to protect lives and property of Nigerians.
“Life supersedes everything and we are not going to allow these products into the markets,” he said.
The director-general said SON was still on the trail of the importers of the goods with no economic value, pointing out that the agency would stop at nothing until it got them prosecuted.
Also, at the event, the Head, Enforcement, Nigeria Copyright Commission (NCC), Lagos Office, Charles Amudipe, commended SON for its fight against substandard goods in the country, noting that the counterfeited products were not fit for use.
“At NCC, we deal with infringing materials, piracy and all the likes and just like these products, we are having here.
“They are counterfeited and they are not fit for the end users. What SON is doing today is a huge leap that is the fight against counterfeit.
