ANCO @ Retreat Seek Improved Government Attention

Members of the Association of Nigerian Courier Operators (ANCO) on Wednesday moved to the serene Elugushi Beach, Lekki environment to relax and reflect on critical issues of administration, management and governments’ attitude towards the industry.
 
In exclusive chat with Nigeria CommunicationsWeek, Mr. Siyanbola Oladapo, national president of the Association, said the members were concerned with challenges that have hampered businesses, especially in an industry bedeviled by lack of proper regulations.

According to him, the government will continue to lose revenue from the sector that has remained neglected by appropriate authorities, while self-regulation has not become quite fruitful as the Association’s executives are barely eight months in office.

He enumerated issues requiring speedy attention from the government bodies to include aggressive marketing/de-marketing by practitioners; companies that deny shareholders of their right by not organizing Annual general meetings thereby denying the courier companies the privilege of dispatching annual reports.

“There are critical issues in the industry that we thought it wise to move a bit away from our offices and the Lagos metropolis’ beehive of activities; go to a serene environment and reflect on these issues.

“For instance, when pricing of items for delivery. There are stakeholders who have yet to understand the times we are in. For instance, how can a registrar give a courier company a parcel of about 400 pieces to deliver in Borno at N4, 000? Does it cover the transport? How about the hotel accommodation, hence the issue of insecurity has led to many of us to close down our North operational offices. So, we have to go back and think on the way forward.

“Aside that, we have been clamoring for an independent regulator for nine (9) years now. There are certain incidences and unethical practices that the Commission would have addressed, like de-marketing of operator by a fellow operator. So, in the meantime, we have to talk to ourselves on how to move forward,” he said.

Oladapo added that ANCO executives work round the clock to bring sanity in the system pending when the National Assembly grants their heartbeats of legislating on an independent regulator for the industry.