NCS, Benin Customs Launches Digital Trade System; CDES At Seme-Krake Border
By DAPO OLAWUNI
In a major push toward seamless regional trade, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and the Republic of Benin Customs have officially launched the Customs Declarations Exchange System (CDES), a shared trade platform engineered to enable real-time interoperability and track transit goods from origin to destination.
Speaking to journalists on Friday at the Seme-Krake Joint Border Post following a joint inspection operation and the signing of a bilateral agreement, the Comptroller-General of Customs, Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, emphasized that the new technology was custom-built by both administrations to reflect their specific operational traits and trade expectations.
Adeniyi highlighted that real-time visibility across the border will dramatically enhance enforcement, ensuring that risk alerts raised by one administration reach the other while still actionable.
Beyond digital connectivity, the joint assessment identified critical operational priorities required to transform the corridor, including restoring broken-down scanners, reinforcing access control, surveillance, and lighting, and establishing harmonized bilingual operating procedures.
“What we seek to achieve here is that this border post be treated as a strategic modernization program and not as a series of isolated repairs,”
“The objective is a model, technology-enabled joint border post built on customs interconnectivity, joint risk management, coordinated enforcement, secure infrastructure, and accountable joint governance. If we achieve that here, we will have built a template for every other crossing within the ECOWAS community and the African continent.” Adeniyi stated
Addressing the human element of border commerce, Adeniyi highlighted the critical role of women traders, who make up over 70% of informal cross-border traders across Africa and face disproportionate challenges from delays, opacity, and harassment.
To address this, the Nigeria Customs Service launched a dedicated facility tailored to small-scale women traders.
“Its purpose is to bring women into the formal trading system on terms that they can actually meet, simplifying procedures for small consignments, providing clear published information in local languages, and offering accessible contact points and formal channels for complaints,” Adeniyi explained.
The Customs chief noted that true success will not be measured by signed agreements or commissioning ceremonies, but by operational efficiency on the ground, whether a truck carrying goods from Cotonou to Lagos clears the post once instead of twice, and whether traders can cross within an hour rather than spending an entire day at the border.
Adeniyi expressed gratitude to the government and people of the Republic of Benin, acknowledging the foundational collaboration begun under former President Patrice Talon and continued support under President Romuald Wadagni, alongside key partners including the ECOWAS Commission, European Union, AfCFTA Secretariat, African Development Bank, and technical partner BSMART from Uganda.
Also speaking, the Director General of Benin Republic Customs Service, Col Raof Malehosso Aboudou said that one of the benefits of this CDES platform is that it would reduce stress for stakeholders, and that it enables both customs organisation to access information launched by traders in real time.
“It reduces stress for travelers and every other person that uses the Joint Order Post and the Joint Order Post also gives birth to coordinated risk management, which is actually one of the core values of the World Customs Organization”
Aboudou said it was necessary to engage the stakeholders when embarking on this kind of initiative because they are the ones that feel the heat the most.
“When there is smooth movement at any border, it is the stakeholders that enjoy it at the end of the day. When things are not working, they are the ones that also suffer it. That is why it is very important to involve them.
He said that Africa is blessed to have CGC Adeniyi as the current Chairperson of World Customs Organization (WCO).
“We are lucky in Africa, in West Africa, and particularly in Nigeria, to have someone like him. Because he is someone who is committed to improving intra-Africa trade and trade in West Africa, and seeing modernized customs, not just only in Nigeria, but in West Africa and in Africa in general.
“The future of the customs really appreciates and recognizes his commitment. Just a few days after I was appointed as the Director General of Customs in Benin Republic, the CGC put a call to me and discussed the need for us to pay a visit to the deep bridge somewhere in Zimbabwe, so that we can go and see how organized the one-stop order post is, and see how it can be replicated here in the Joint Order Post Centre.
“He picked me him up and also went to pick the Director General of the Cameroonian Customs and we all went together to do a visit to the deep bridge, and saw how things are being done, how things are actually working, how they are supposed to work, how there is smooth operation of customs” he said
The Benin Customs Chief said that during their visit, both customs bosses observed that there is better coordination and there is interoperability between the two customs administrations in Zimbabwe, and also better coordination when it comes to human and material resources.
“We also observed that the customs systems are well-connected, there is proper communication between the two customs systems.
Consequently, we saw why it is necessary to come and replicate same system here.
The high point of the event was the commissioning of facilities including a centre for women, a mosque, and a public facility.
