Tamale, Jan. 25, GNA - Despite the conflict situations in some parts of the Northern Region the Customs Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS last year collected 32.9 billion cedis as against the projected figure of 28.7 billion cedis, exceeding its target by 15 per cent, the Regional Commander, Mr Sam Afari-Aikins announced in Tamale on Saturday.
He said at the beginning of the last quarter, revenue collection was only 9.79 billion cedis but through prudent planning and support from the personnel the trend was quickly reversed.
Mr Afari-Aikins was addressing personnel of the CEPS at the end of year party to take stock and evaluate their performance to enable them to plan for this year.
He said because of the state of emergency imposed on Dagbon, anti-smuggling activities were drastically curtailed, while most of the out-stations were also rendered unattractive to the trading public and this affected revenue performance in the area.
The Regional Commander reminded the personnel that it was the objective of the CEPS to collect and account for all duties, taxes, revenue and penalties in fulfilment of the mission statement of the service.
He urged the personnel to brace up to the numerous challenges confronting them without regard to the poor working and living conditions that most of them were faced with.
Mr Afari-Aikins reminded the personnel that "in spite of the acute logistics problems and the non-appreciation of our efforts by the public, we should continue to put in our best to ensure that we achieve and possibly exceed our revenue targets at all times", saying, "this is the only way we can improve the negative perception of the public about us."
He mentioned the lack of official residential accommodation, inadequate communication equipment as some of the problems facing CEPS in the region and called on the authorities to improve the situation to enhance revenue collection.
The Region Commander expressed regret that personnel of the service were renting rooms in houses within the very community whose trading activities they were supposed to monitor.
Mr Afari-Aikins reminded the personnel about the HIV/AIDS pandemic and said customs officials had been identified as one of the most vulnerable groups due the nature of their work and urged them to always remember to use the condom if they could not abstained.
Hardworking workers who put in their best to promote the good name of the service were awarded prizes.