Malfunctions observed in the operation of this system raise fears of a fall in customs revenue due to the unsuitability of the new system based on Korean technology UNIPASS.
Will Cameroonian authorities have the courage or the necessary foresight to question the new customs system which has been operational since April 6, 2020 at the port of Douala and whose dysfunctions are likely to cause a drastic drop in customs revenue? Difficult to answer this question.
Except that in this period of health crisis linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact is already being felt on the national economy. Economic operators, in particular members of the Union of Shipowners of Cameroon (UCAM) do not hide their disappointment, and do not hide that in view of the current situation, it would be better for the moment to continue with the ASYCUDA customs system, even if it means improving it.
The reason, “the introduction of CAMCIS creates more problems than it is supposed to solve, demonstrating in the open, the unpreparedness and the business that revolve around this system.” Consequently, we lose efficiency because of “the incongruities of the new system, and in the end, we no longer know which system is operational. Customs told us that everything was turned over to CAMCIS. However, this is not true. They are sometimes obliged to do with ASYCUDA to process the files. At the same time, some customs officials tell you that if your file was being processed by ASYCUDA, you must stop the process and start from scratch with CAMCIS ”.
Even within the customs administration, voices are raised to decry this new system “import” from South Korea, and whose implementation is not smoothly only in Cameroon, since some countries like from Ghana, parliamentary proceedings are underway to push the government to move away from the UNIPASS system and to prosecute GCNet which operates at the port of Takoradi.
And for good reason, “the Ghanaian government has a 35% stake in GCNet. The latter pays part of the profits made through his fees of 0.4% in the form of dividends for participation in the government. With the remaining 65% of the profit, GCNet pays the taxes. On the other hand, the government has a 0% stake in UNIPASS and no dividends will be paid to the government. “
Because the “same causes produce the same effects”, the users’ concern is explained all the more since it is Cameroonian and foreign private individuals who are behind with UNIPASS and of whom CAMCIS is only the visible side of the iceberg “, Say UCAM members.
Yet its designers defend themselves, “CAMCIS is an electronic customs clearance system that integrates the entire customs clearance procedure, considerably reducing the time required to complete import and export procedures while securing it. duties and taxes ”.
On the ground, the reality is quite different. Which should challenge the highest state authorities to quickly review their copy, then of internal sources, languages are untied to recognize that the Minister of Finance was misled by his collaborators, in particular those of the General Directorate of customs (DGD).
We remember that a few weeks ago, in a correspondence with the Minister of Finance, the UCAM indicated in particular that “on the pilot site of Kribi, the implementation is not complete because only the import and the transhipment are partly functional On export, no manifest has been submitted to date, the transhipment procedure being blocked and incomplete. Boarding authorizations are also done manually. On import, the file format which allows the submission of manifests without manual entry is being produced by the technical services of all the consignees with a delivery estimate in early March 2020. “
A joint Cenadi / Dsi mission deployed from 2 to 13 December 2019, had already identified malfunctions of the new system, hence the instructions from the Minister of Finance on 19 December 2019 to operate the two systems in parallel for a given period ‘ASYCUDA will be in production and CAMCIS in test mode with comparison of the results on the two environments and relating to the same operations ” Louis-Paul Motazé indicated.
Almost five months later, things are not getting much better. A situation likely to cause enormous damage to the State with the fall in customs revenue from which partisan interests will unfortunately benefi
