Coming off a year in which it blew past its revenue target, the Nigeria Customs Service has secured Senate approval for an even more ambitious N11.074 trillion goal in 2026, alongside a N1.235 trillion spending plan, after Comptroller General Bashir Adewale Adeniyi defended the numbers before the Senate Committee on Customs and Excise.
Committee Chairman Senator Isah Jibrin praised the reforms behind the agency’s recent performance in revenue collection, anti smuggling work and trade facilitation, crediting President Bola Tinubu’s decision to extend Adeniyi’s tenure with giving him room to fully lock those gains in within the next six months. Jibrin called Customs one of the country’s most important revenue engines and pushed the agency to work even harder given the scale of the federal government’s infrastructure ambitions.
The numbers behind that confidence: Customs collected N7.277 trillion in 2025 against a National Assembly approved target of N6.584 trillion, beating it by N674.1 billion, or just over 10 percent, despite a string of policy decisions that quietly cut into potential revenue, including suspended excise duty on telecoms, a delayed Green Tax, waived import duties on CNG vehicles, electric vehicles and healthcare equipment, and disruption to wheat imports from the Russia Ukraine war. Even with strong collections, the agency itself only received N808.86 billion, about 71 percent, of its approved N1.132 trillion 2025 operating budget.
For 2026, the N11.074 trillion target breaks down into N5.542 trillion from the Federation Account, N1.491 trillion from non Federation sources, N2.773 trillion from import VAT and N1.266 trillion from the four percent free on board cost of collection, a projection Adeniyi tied to the now fully operational Unified Customs Information System, internally called B’Odogwu, tighter post clearance audits and sharper intelligence led anti smuggling work, reforms that recently earned Customs recognition from the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council as the government’s most improved agency on ease of doing business. He cautioned, though, that tensions around the Strait of Hormuz have already dented global supply chains and cargo volumes into Nigeria, part of why first half 2026 collections of roughly N4.043 trillion fell short of the roughly N5.5 trillion midyear goal, even as June delivered the year’s strongest single month so far.
Adeniyi also updated senators on AfCFTA implementation, noting Customs is working with the AfCFTA Secretariat, the African Development Bank and neighbouring administrations on joint border posts, with Nigerian officials set to study Zimbabwe’s joint arrangement with South Africa for possible use at Seme and other crossings. Pressed on a N210.64 billion line item for financial and miscellaneous services, he explained it follows the federal government’s standard Chart of Accounts and bundles 84 approved items, from publicity and foreign missions to recruitment and laboratory services, all individually documented in the budget submission. The committee approved both the revenue target and spending plan by voice vote without objection.
