How Amaechi Deceived Buhari To Secure Approval For Multi-Billion Port Contract

Facts have emerged as to how the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, deceived President Muhammadu Buhari to secure his approval to award an International Cargo Tracking Note (ICTN) contract to Medtech Scientific Ltd in partnership with Rozi Nigeria Limited while knowing that he was violating the Bureau of Public Procurement regulations.

The ICTN also known as Cargo Tracking Note (CTN) was one of the measures introduced by private initiative with expertise to help, particularly, third world countries that lack global outreach, network and organizational capacity to monitor their trades.

The CTN progenitor designed the service system to provide the needed global network and capacity to monitor in real time, trade information from primary sources in the country of origin to the final destination.

The trade information (notes on the shippers, consignees, cargo details, handling ports etc.) generated is transmitted to the destination ports in advance to compare with shipping documents as provided by shipper’s forwarding agent in the country of origin.

With the exposure of the country to the evolving challenges of safety, security and economics, the Federal Executive Council on the 9th of December, 2009 approved implementation of the CTN scheme by Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) with Messrs Transport and Port Management Systems (TPMS) as the managing agent.

In other words, Federal Government obtained the CTN service which took effect on 11th January 2010 through an agent (third party), TPMS.

The approval process passed through extensive consultation that spanned over two years, covering presentation by the technical partner/managing agent, appraisal of the proposal by NPA, due diligence on the companies (technical partner and vendor), visitation to the implementing countries for on-site experience and recommendation report to the Ministry of Transport.

Consultations were also made on the directive of Federal Executive Council with Nigerian Custom Services, Central Bank of Nigeria, Federal Ministry of Finance, Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs, Federal Ministry of External Affairs and Federal Ministry of Justice.

Approval was conveyed after satisfactory consultations and obtaining due process certificate of “No Objection” from the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) to allow for direct procurement.

The “No Objection” granted to the vendor, TPMS, after due diligence on the technical partner was a confirmation that the knowledge is specialised and the managing agent had a partnership with the proponents of the platform to access the service,” a government document seen by THE WHISTLER states.

The scheme ran for about 18 months but was marred by poor patronage due to lack of enforcement, compliance from stakeholders and poor implementation by the managing agent.

For ulterior motives, findings revealed that the managing agent jettisoned the live platform of the technical partner that provides real time notes, records, statistics and track on ship/cargo without informing NPA, the implementing agency.

This singular action, according to findings compromised the very essence of the scheme and exposed the nation. A committee was set up by NPA to examine the implementation and report any anomaly.

While the committee was on, the scheme was abolished by the federal government due to pressure from Shipping Trade Groups (STG) and Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) who were aversed to the transparency introduced by the scheme.

Though the major clandestine concern of the STG was the ability of the scheme to monitor freight, which they have used irrationally to exploit Nigerians. Also, the transparency introduced by the scheme blocked negative practices of under declaration, wrong classification of cargo, wrong description etc, which lead to revenue leakages in terms of duty, port charges and dues.

More importantly, these vices affected trade records, statistics, safety and greatly compromised national security.

Owing to the discomfort of the Shipping Lines with the full disclosure nature of the scheme and their reluctance to release part of security component of freight as the administrative charge levied on the service especially on container boxes, the STG decried the implementation of the scheme, pointing out that it added to the cost of doing business in the port, contrary to the advertised position that it would be at no cost to the shipper.

In October 2011, responding to the outcry of the STG, the Minister of Finance/Coordinating Minister of the Economy, along with the Economic Team on port decongestion, abrogated the CTN scheme, claiming that it added cost to the Nigerian shipper and the presence of CTN operatives added to the number of undesirable agencies at the port. The decision was in error as the same STG complied with the CTN scheme in neighbouring countries that had far less cargo volume and far cheaper freight. Furthermore, the CTN operation was not part of cargo clearing process in the ports and the implementing agent was not operating from the port as claimed.

Upon abrogation of the CTN scheme, Messrs TPMS proceeded to Arbitration in line with the provision of the Contract Agreement where the matter is pending.

Prior to the abrogation, there was on-going CTN revenue reconciliation and the details of reconciliation showed that total revenue generated was Euro 16,692, 642.20. Messrs. TPMS remitted only Euro 6,388,415.10, leaving an outstanding amount of Euro 3,627,170.22 to make up the 60% share of NPA.

On August 26, this year, a letter written by the Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Transportation, Dr Magdalene Ajani, was sent to the Director-General of the Bureau of Public Procurement requesting for “No Objection” to adopt the direct procurement method for the engagement of new agents/partners to implement the ICTN Scheme in Nigeria.

In the letter, the Transport Ministry made reference to how the President vide letter Ref No SH/COS/17/A/16888 dated August 3,2020 had approved a new process for the selection process and that the Minister of Transport should present to the Federal Executive Council a minimum of three and a maximum of five eligible companies for consideration and approval as Agents/Partners to implement the ICTN scheme in Nigeria.

However, the letter stated that due to time lapse in the four months ultimatum for completion of the process given and in view of the initial approval of Mr President, the Nigerian Shippers Council is desirous to adopt restricted/selective tendering method for expediency in completing the procurement.

Documents available to THE WHISTLER showed that the five companies shortlisted were Medtech Scientific limited/Rozi International Nigeria Limited(local content partner);International Quality solution corp (IQS)/Winslow logistics Limited (local content partner); Flexigistic/Senk Risk Management Limited(local content partner); Global link logistics/Hybride Network (Nigeria) Limited (local content partner) and Yusen Logistics/Dune engineering Limited(local content partner).
The letter stated, “In order to ameliorate further cargo related national insecurity, loss of huge revenue and provide reliable statistics, the honourable minister sought and obtained Mr President’s anticipatory approval to directly engage Messrs Medtech Scientific Limited in partnership with Rozi International Nigeria Ltd to avoid delay in implementation of ICTN.

“In view of the foregoing, the Bureau is requested to kindly grant certificate of “No Objection” to adopt Direct Procurement method in line with Part VII Section 42(2)(b) of the Public Procurement Act 2007 for engagement of Messrs Medtech Scientific Limited in partnership with Rozi International Nigeria Ltd as new Agents/Partners to implement the ICTN.”

Two weeks after the Permanent Secretary’s letter to BPP, Amaechi wrote a letter to the President dated August 17,2021 urging the President to reconfirm his earlier approval granted to procure a suitable and qualified company to carry out the relevant cargo tracking responsibilities.

The letter addressed specifically to Buhari reads in part, “You had earlier granted an approval that we commence the process of procuring a suitable Company to engage in cargo tracking. While in the process of procuring such a qualified Company, we noticed another approval was granted to the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Petroleum.

“I am requesting that Mr President reconfirms his earlier approval and direct that the Ministry engage Messrs Medtech Scientific Limited in partnership with Rozi International Nigeria Ltd to be presented to the Bureau of Public Procurement and the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission to avoid delay in the implementation of ICTN.”

The President after going through the letter gave approval to the request of the Minister.

However, the deal was faulted by the Bureau of Public Procurement on the basis that it did not follow due process.

In a a letter dated September 17 and addressed to the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Transport, the BPP said that it had “carefully reviewed the current submission of the FMT (Federal Ministry of Transport) and observed with concern that the Ministry)
/Nigeria’s Shippers Council did not adopt international competitive bidding in line with the recommendation of the Bureau.”

It stated that rather, the ministry adopted Restricted Tendering Method contrary to the directive of the President which was conveyed through a letter dated February 19,2021.

“The adoption of Restrictive Tendering by the FMT was inconsistent with the approval granted by His Excellency, Mr President in February 2021. This procedure also contravened Section 40(1) of the Public Procurement Act 2007 as there was no prior approval from the Bureau before adopting Restricted Tendering exercise,” the letter added

It added, “The Ministry’s explanation that the Restricted Tendering method was adopted instead of the International Competitive Bidding Method that was initially approved by Mr President as a result of the time lapse in the four months ultimatum for completion of the bidding process is not tenable.”

The BPP said in the circumstance where the Ministry of Transport realised that the period approved for the procurement process was inadequate, it ought to have reverted to the President for approval for extension of time instead of proceeding to “adopt a different procurement method that was neither approved by Mr President nor approved by the Bureau in line with the provisions of the PPA 2007.”

On the process of selecting Messrs Medtech Scientific Limited in partnership with Rozi International Nigeria Ltd out of the other five competing firms for direct procurement, the BPP stated in the letter that this appears subjective particularly on the strength of assertion made by the Ministry that the five shortlisted companies were known to have proven records of experience, competency and reliability to execute the services.

“This procedure is clearly against the spirit and intent of the PPA 2007 and if challenged has the propensity to embarrass government. This clearly is not in the best interest of government,” it added.

The BPP in the letter signed by its Director-General,Amman Ahmadu told the Ministry that it was wrong to draw the exalted office of the President into a routine administrative issues such as procurement processes.

It said, “Considering that procurement processes can be subjected to judicial redress where parties are aggrieved or dissatisfied with the outcomes there is need to ensure that the exalted office of His Excellency is properly insulated from such practices by procuring entities.”

It advised the Ministry to restrict all procurement processes to the BPP to handle in order to absolve the President from any litigation or embarrassment that could arise from any procurement process that ends up on court.