Seek foreign help over port hitches, cargo firms tell TPA

By Rosemary Mirondo

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Dar es Salaam. Following technical challenges in the Electronic Single Window System (eSWS) for

clearing goods at the Dar es Salaam Port, Tanzania Freight Forwarders Association (Taffa) yesterday advised the government to involve foreign experts to end the problem.

Taffa president Edward Urio said this yesterday during a morning program run by a local TV station.

The programme, among other things, discussed the challenges faced last week by port stakeholders after technical hitches in the eSWS that forced the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) to revert to the Tanzania Customs Integrated Systems (TANCIS).

He argued that the country should not entertain trial-and-error methods in its revenue collection systems because it adversely affected tax collection and ultimately the country’s development.

Dar Port’s eSWS is an integrated cargo clearance and payments system and also allows parties involved in international trade and transport to lodge standardized information and documents with a single entry point to fulfil all import, export and transit related regulatory requirements.

The main benefits of eSWs is that all clearing and forwarding agents (CFAs) lodge only a single declaration to all government departments responsible with cargo clearance. In this context, this fast tracks the clearance bureaucracy at both entry and exit points such as ports, airports and border points.

He said there were 100 containers that were not cleared during the crisis, burdening clearing firms with storage fees reaching as high as $40,000 a container, demurrage fees causing major losses to businesses.

“We need these systems in our course of work and when the government decides to come up with a new technology, there must be reference on how it works and what can be done to fix it when it malfunctions. These clearance systems need to be international because international goods are being cleared. We all know that Tancis was put in place by a Korean company and I’m not even sure whether the Electronic Government Agency (EGA) has global expertise,” he observed.

In response, TRA’s Taxpayer Services and Education director Richard Kayombo defended local experts involved in putting up the system saying they were highly qualified experts and that the country had many experts in different fields and therefore though the eSWS had malfunctioned it was being fixed and would soon be running again. “If you remember even Tancis had challenges but it’s now working well, and if you must know if the systems encounters technical challenges, TRA suffers because it cannot collect revenues as per targets,” he said.

He noted that the eSWS was an integrated system that bring all government institutions in one place in order to end bureaucracy and allow payments and inspection to take place in a single window.

Migration to the Electronic Single Window System (eSWS) at the port aims at allowing smooth transition from Automated System for Customs Data (Asycuda) to the Tanzania Customs Integrated Systems (TANCIS).