Tinubu hails AfCFTA nod for Nigeria’s Customs reform; celebrates Bergmans’ multi‑billion‑dollar win

By Johnbosco Agbakwuru

ABUJA—PRESIDENT Bola Tinubu has applauded the increasing continental recognition of Nigeria’s customs modernisation programme and praised the selection of a subsidiary of Nigerian-owned Bergmans Security Consultant and Supplies Limited to implement a 20-year, multi‑billion‑dollar AfCFTA Customs Modernisation Project.

Bergmans will carry out the project through its subsidiary AfriTrade CMP Limited, installing both digital and physical infrastructure to streamline customs operations, enhance cargo tracking, strengthen border management, and enable trade-data exchange among participating African nations.

A second Bergmans subsidiary, Trade Modernisation Project Limited, is leading Nigeria’s domestic customs modernisation programme.

President Tinubu said the development validates Nigeria’s capacity to build homegrown solutions for the wider African market.

The President in a statement by his spokesman, Mr. Bayo Onanuga was quoted as saying: “What has been built and tested in Nigeria is now providing a model for the continent.

“This is how African integration should work: Africans building African solutions for African opportunities. Nigeria must not only participate in Africa’s single market. Nigerian institutions and businesses can help build the technology and infrastructure that will make that market work. Under our Nigeria First policy, we will continue to create opportunities for capable Nigerian businesses to compete at home, across Africa and globally.

“I commend Bergmans, AfriTrade CMP Limited, Trade Modernisation Project Limited, the Nigeria Customs Service, CGC Bashir Adewale Adeniyi and the Nigerian professionals whose work has earned this confidence.”

AfCFTA Secretary-General Wamkele Mene, while in Abuja for the agreement, also visited the Nigeria Customs Service headquarters to see the Nigerian programme in operation. Members of the Senate Committee on Customs, led by Senator Jibrin Isah, joined the visit at the conclusion of their two-day retreat on Customs modernisation and reforms. Mene described B’Odogwu, Nigeria’s indigenous Unified Customs Management System, as a model for Africa and disclosed that non-African companies had offered similar services. But AfCFTA chose an African solution, underscoring the importance of African excellence and innovation.

Senator Isah, after seeing the systems at work, said members of his committee had become its ambassadors.

B’Odogwu, first piloted in October 2024, has become central to Customs modernisation in Nigeria alongside cargo tracking, data infrastructure, surveillance, risk management and non-intrusive inspection. The programme is also being integrated with the National Single Window, launched in March 2026 to provide a single digital gateway for cross-border trade processes.

“The promise of AfCFTA will be realised when goods can move across African borders faster, at lower cost and with fewer barriers. Nigeria is ready to contribute its experience, innovation and enterprise to that future,” President Tinubu added.

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