It’s a whole, whole dirty ring that going on outside there – it is just nasty.

This was the sentence shot at THE NEW TODAY by a senior Customs Officer who wants the 18-month old Dickon Mitchell-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration to seriously address allegations that some staffers at the major revenue collection Department were engaged in rampant acts of corruption and defrauding the state of thousands of dollars.

He called on the government in which Finance Minister Dennis Cornwall is the Line Minister for Customs and his brother Mike Sylvester is the Permanent Secretary to look at making fundamental changes to the operations at Customs in order to help stem the tide of corruption.

The officer suggested that “a good team of about four officers” should be put in place and given the responsibility to “spot check things at any minute” that is about to leave the compound.

According to the Customs insider, whenever a Container “is being done, just say give me the document for that – let me look at it.”

“You go down on the Trafficker’s Wharf, you see goods going out, you say hey stop it right dey, give me the documents and you check it against the document that you paid Customs for the goods,” he said.

The officer indicated that the Customs Department needs to engage in what he described as “a surprised post-check” on goods entering and leaving the port so that “when you get anything wrong you make people (those involved in corruption) pay for it.”

“When I say you make people pay, I mean you hold people (Customs Officers) accountable,” he remarked.

He pointed out that a scam that is often run on the Port is that some corrupt Customs officers will report that imported goods by a businessman came into the country short although the full consignment did arrive and duties were paid on the full amount.

He said the next shipment of goods by the businessman will not be subjected to duties since he is listed as already having paid duties to the government but the State is in effect losing out on thousands of dollars in revenue.

He noted that this can be handled easily by Customs.

“You could go back and check the Manifest, check from Miami and get the information from Miami and know the person got all their goods,” he said.

The Customs insider raised concerns about the loss of revenue to the government on vehicles coming into the country since in many cases any kind of price is given by the importers and accepted without Customs doing a thorough check.

He charged that “one or two” Customs Officers are working in collusion with a few Brokers on the port in a deliberate scheme to beat the system.

He quoted a few Brokers as saying to him that they normally do the paperwork to clear goods based on figures provided to them by importers and it was up to the Customs Department to check the accuracy.

“One or two other Brokers … say basically (that) whatever figure them (Business) people give me, I just make the entry and if Customs accept it that is their business – let them do what they do,” he said.

According to the Customs insider, in some cases a broker will say that a businessman will send him to a specific Customs Officer to help clear his goods on the port which seems to suggest that the individual is on the payroll of the business enterprise.

He rejected the notion of rotating Customs officers from one area to another to solve the problem of corruption among them.

“The corruption (is) following them anywhere they go. A corrupt officer is a corrupt officer – you just moving the problem to a different area.

“Moving around an officer – you move him from the Port and you put him in Grenville is the same thing. You put him some way he’s going to give you a bad classification and (the importer) will pay less (duties to government).”

The Customs Insider went on to say: “To know that (Customs) system, you have to be in it to understand it.”

He also quoted a high up member of the Customs Department as indicating to him that a particular officer is “too corrupt” and that he did not want to have anything to do with him.

He spoke of an incident in which a Customs Officer in Shed 1 directed an individual to make out an entry for his goods because the value was too much to be processed via a C-22 Form.

He said that another Customs Officer approached the individual to come back to him when the other officer who is his senior took his lunch break, for him to value the goods on a C-22 document for an agreed fee.

The senior Customs Officer called for the return of Acting Comptroller of Customs Algernon Belfon in a roaming position on the port to help stem the endemic corruption taking place in this important government revenue area by some staffers.

“Since Belfon was moved upstairs because when Belfon was downstairs or on the floor like roving, everybody was afraid to do wrong because Belfon will show up anytime. So once Belfon is up there and he won’t be down dey, there is nobody else (to do the job) – everybody else jump on the bandwagon (of corruption),” he said.