Nigerian Business Owners Lament High Cost Of Doing Business

For any nation to thrive, a core ingredient and fundamental drive are the local businesses and small businesses.

In it’s 2020 forecast released late 2019, the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCi) had projected high cost of doing business in Nigeria.

The Director General of LCCI, Muda Yusuf in his 2019 economic review and outlook for 2020 identified had infrastructural challenges such as erratic power supply, congestions at ports, inefficient road and railway system combined with the multiplicity of levies, inconsistency in government policies and excessive regulations as constraints that may continue to hinder ease of doing business.

And it appears this may not be far from the reality and experiences Nigerian businessmen encountered in the outline year.

High cost of clearing goods, the delay in clearing process at the port where the earliest a container can be processed to leave the port is two months are all pointers to the fact that the touted ease of doing business by the Federal government may not be really so in reality.

The experience shared by a Twitter user identified as Pierre is indeed illustrative of the daily difficulty encountered by business men. He tweets thus,

”Running a manufacturing company in Nigeria is miraculous stuff. Not a single spare is produced here, Forex is super scarce, the ports don’t work efficiently, raw materials are hard to source, regulatory bodies swarm, power is bad and government taxes you to stupor. Nightmare.

He continues saying, ”I was actually just stating the obvious with this tweet. Banks can only give you $2000 in a month, so if you need $20k, it’ll take 10 months. Clearing stuff from Apapa takes 2 months minimum. Which economy grows in this manner?”

A cross section of responses monitored goes to buttress this fact:

@MaziOmenuko

It costs average of N1.2mil to freight a 20ft container from China to Apapa; and N1.6mil to move it from Apapa to Ikeja. We spend over N4mil monthly on diesel for gen, at the end, 30% of all our profits goes to govt as tax. It’s a  sad story.

We have to get dozens of pro forma of same items and open form m on each so we can pull funds from the monthly $2k cbn makes available. At times, u just give up and source from parallel market rate. It gets worse, cbn gave us a new yr gift by devaluing the naira to N401.

Of course it’s a very lucrative racketeering! Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) should be focused on getting CBN have fx available for manufacturers. CBN dont give any support to manufacturing sector which is the bedrock of the economy. Really a sad story!

@9ijasamurai

Some of us that export and need some imported input , we buy raw materials at ₦470/$ and CBN expect us to sell FX proceed at the rate of 390… Welcome to organised chaos

If I open book …!!!??? Let me just keep kwayet.

 

Oooh your trucks need to pay about 250k to access the port or you use Barge ….it is a crazy world here ..

@Cocomama

30% TAX??? Where does this TAX reflect in Nigeria pls I’m trying to check something ☹️🤯🤬

@bewitaye

@ProfOsinbajo the government needs to do something about this if there is any genuine intention towards ease of doing business in Nigeria.

@nwosuvictor

Very sad indeed!

We don’t produce, but when we try to import, see wahala! When this Covid-19 vaccine arrives, u ll hear d same story. Wickedness in high places!!!

@kingsiao

My brother you don’t know the half! It took me 1 year to import a machine and another 4months to have it cleared! And while it was being cleared my BOI facility had lost its value by 35% due to covid ! I had to source extra 35% locally to pay up for the equipment that I sourced..

@eniteyoung

With continental free trade, many people may see its more feasible to produce from a neigbouring African country and export here

Nigeria increased electricity bill Ghana made it free for 3 months

As a manufacturer, where would you rather produce from?

Nigeria or Ghana?

@UmezeloraChuks

If my market is Nigeria I will still stay in Nigeria…it all depends on numbers. I will need to check the cost of electricity vs other factors. Also how friendly will Ghanaians be to a foreigner making waves in their country…it’s complicated but patriotism fuels the passion..