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A bill the Ministry of Revenues (MoR) tabled to
Parliament on May 7, 2008, in a bid to merge the
Ethiopian Customs Authority, the Federal Inland
Revenue Authority and the ministry is to disband the
customs police, often called Finance Police. The
task of preventing contraband activities, detecting
and apprehending criminal suspects would be given to
the federal police.
Although officials at the Customs Authority had
requested the government, a year ago, to reinforce
customs police with modern weapons, including a
helicopter so as to control organized contra
bandits, the bill goes in direct contradiction to
their pleas.
According to the bill, the cost of preparing the
customs police for the new duty, along with the
complicated revenue collection system, are the
reasons why they have been disbanded and the
responsibility given to the federal police.
Thus, the federal police have a responsibility to
organize and deploy police forces to prevent
criminal offences from being committed in violation
of custom and tax laws.
The accountability of the federal police in charge
should be the responsibility of the evolving
authority, according to Yohannes W. Gebriel, former
Legal Department head of the Ethiopian Customs
Authority.
“The draft law does not clearly state the
accountability of the federal police with regard to
customs. If the federal police is not accountable to
the new authority, a conflict of interest may
possibly rise between the two entities like what
happened when finance police was accountable to the
Finance ministry”, Yohannes told Fortune.
Before the Ethiopian Customs Authority was
established as an autonomous authority in 1997, the
finance police was accountable to the Ministry of
Finance. Finally, finance police gave its power to
custom police, who are drawn from the country’s
defense force.
When it was established, it had 1,200 forces;
however they are now estimated to be less than 900.
The bill does not indicate the fate of customs
police but Yosef Shiferaw, acting head of Public
Relations at the MoR believes the pending Business
Process Reengineering (BPR) study, which brought
about the reform, is also expected to determine
their fate, but it does not mean that there will not
be a layoff of incompetent employees, he disclosed.
Even though the bill grants customs policing to the
federal police, a department responsible for the
proposed duty has not yet been established.
Demsash Hailu (Commander), public relations head of
the federal police, also believes the BPR should
create the department.
“Federal police has been participating in preventing
customs offences,” he told Fortune. “It is
simple to take over the responsibility.”
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