Automated procedures of customs clearance is required to stall the disappearance of containers which had frequently happened in the country, according to official sources here. There is need to formulate adoptable policies at government level to avoid mega container scams to be followed with automated procedures to keep an eye on the movement of containers, they said.
Recently, Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had taken a suo motu notice of alleged embezzlement of billions of rupees under the garb of supplies made to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Nato forces operating in Afghanistan.
Reportedly, over 10,000 to 11,000 containers, destined for ISAF have not reached Afghanistan yet, causing huge revenue losses to the national exchequer. Ironically, customs officials have denied facts, saying that reports pertaining to 11,000 containers for ISAF in Afghanistan are totally baseless. Pakistan Automated Customs Computerised System (PaCCS) had disclosed the disappearance of over 10,000 containers of expensive goods. After that the case was taken up by the Supreme Court of Pakistan for hearing.
It has been observed that the container scam had occurred due to the basic critical weakness in the manual customs system, which relies on paper documents and its acceptance at the discretion of colluding customs officials. Since paper documents could be forged, the scam was made possible.
In PaCCS, such scams are not possible because the customs server is directly connected to the shipping lines, the agents, and the terminals. Unless duties and taxes are paid in the bank, the computers do not clear the consignments and do not send electronic release. Since no paper documents are involved, they cannot be forged and since no customs officials are involved in release of containers, they cannot collude.
The current mega container scam has shaken the country. These missing containers, it has been reported, caused a loss of Rs 220 million to the national exchequer. Earlier, in 2008, another mega container scam had taken place in which 400 Afghanistan bound containers carrying goods worth billions of rupees had gone missing. The clearing agents are said to have forged paper documents of customs and ISAF and had cleared hundreds of containers undetected over many months using the discretion of colluding customs officials who chose to accept fictitious and forged documents for their own benefit while depriving the public exchequer of hundreds of millions in revenue.
The first mega container scam had taken place at QICT, involving hundreds of containers, and revenue losses running into hundreds of millions of rupees. Such scams occur because of manual and semi-automated procedures. The computerised system PaCCS was launched to automate the customs procedures but some customs officials have created hurdles in its implementation on all terminals. The purpose behind the introduction of such automated system was to eradicate the menace of corruption. According to stakeholders, it is imperative that PaCCS should be installed at remaining terminals, particularly when Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh has also given green signal to PaCCS.