To boost customs control chain efficiency: Customs strengthens technical, legal capacities of personnel.

This is at a six-day training workshop organised at the Customs Training Centre in Nomayos on the outskirts of Yaounde. The capacity-building workshop was opened July 1 by the Director General of Customs, Edwin Fongod Nuvaga. 

It has brought together customs personnel from the central services and the Littoral and South II Customs Sectors.

According to the Customs DG, the training reflects the importance its administration attaches to the quality of customs action, the mastery of procedures, the legal security of operations, and the overall performance of its control apparatus. 

He further expressed the hierarchy’s determination of placing the Customs administration within a constant dynamic of professionalisation, harmonisation of practices, and consolidation of competencies.

Fongod stressed that the session aims to ensure that each officer concerned has the tools necessary to carry out their duties with competence, confidence, and responsibility.

“One must know who controls, what to control, when to control, where to control, and how to control. One must also know at what point a control becomes a finding, then a dispute, and finally a matter brought before the competent courts. At each stage, the quality of administrative action rests on mastery of the rules, precision of qualification, accuracy of documents, and the robustness of evidence,” Fongod said.

The Chief of Brigade at the Investigation and Enforcement Division, Kinyuy Francis, explained that the need for better the efficiency and performance as concerns customs audit warranted the Customs administration to hold the strategic seminar. 

Kinyuy said in recent times they have observed a lot of litigations with respect to the work done by collaborators in the customs control chain.

To fix such trend, Dr Guy Innocent Diffouo, Head of Legislation Unit at Directorate General of Customs, said the training covers customs controls, identification of customs offences, sanctioning of detected infractions, and possible courts referral cases and follow-up of the proceedings. 

“It is designed for customs officers who are regularly deployed on control duties, to remind them of their own rights and obligations as inspectors, as well as the rights and obligations of economic operators during inspections,” Dr Diffouo said. 

The session also informs them about the full range of procedures including the duration of controls, where they take place, the actions to be taken, and the precautionary measures needed to identify and preserve evidence of violations of customs legislation.

“This is indeed a genuine opportunity not only to revisit the existing framework for penalising customs offences, but above all to reflect on new approaches that would make sanctions more effective, or to consider new penalties better suited to the current economic context,” Dr Diffouo, one of the facilitators, added.

One of the participants, Senior Customs Inspector, Evega Evega Emerand, said the seminar is timely as the will perfect their actions on the field. 

“Our division is responsible for overseeing foreign trade operations and exchanges. We are grateful to the Director General of Customs for this opportunity to strengthen our capacities through this training, which will certainly help us carry out our duties more effectively, be more diligent, and meet the objectives assigned to us,” he highlighted.

He then explained that in the exercise of their duties, they often face challenges like delay tactics used by customs users, which cause inspections that should normally be completed within three months to drag on for nearly a year. 

“This is far from ideal scenario and it slows down our work and prevents us from meeting our assigned objectives in a timely manner,” he added.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3836 of Friday July 03, 2026