By Ajibola Adedoye
In its anti-smuggling fight for the month of February 2024, operatives of Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) Federal Operations Unit Zone A has intercepted three export bound trucks headed to the Republic of Benin laden with 880 bags of white beans, 584 bags of onions and 18 bags of dry pepper at Ajilete/Idiroko road in Ogun state.
Making this announcement in a press briefing in Lagos on Friday, March 8, 2024, Controller Federal Operations Unit Zone A, Comptroller Hussein Kehinde Ejibunu said “Instead of seizing the food items, this Unit ensured the trucks were re-directed to the Nigerian markets where they were sold to Nigerians by the owners” .
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According to him, during the month under review “a total number of 93 seizures and arrest 9 were made to prevent smuggling and protect our national economy.
“The seizures made are worth a total duty paid value of N751,127,025 These outcomes were achieved despite the unrepentant behaviours of economic saboteurs who deploy many tricks and antics to beat our checks but they failed.
“A reference case is the smuggling of foreign parboiled rice in petroleum jerrycans along Ajilete in Ogun state which is not only illegal but also exposes the potential consumers to the risk of eating contaminated grains that have ingested poisonous properties possibly from premium motor spirit (PMS), diesel, or other petroleum products. We also prevented the smuggling of eleven exotic used vehicles worth over N200m into the country through our area of responsibility.
“Smugglers of these vehicles met our stiff resistance against their duty evasion and deviant behaviour.
“The sum of N78,164,255.20 was recovered as revenue into the federation account through the issuance of demand notices (DN) on Customs duties that were discovered to be underpaid.
“As usual, rice was top on the list of our February 2024 seizures in terms of volume and value. A total of 3,779 X 50kg bags of suspected foreign rice equivalent to over 7 trailer loads worth over N365m were seized from various parts of the South West.
“Other items seized in the month under review include one locally made gun and six pieces of empty cartridges at Abeokuta road, 731 parcels of Indian hemp weighing 482kg, 1 X 40ft container found to contain 286 cartons of new rubber slippers, 7 units of used motorcycles, 28,000 litres of premium motor spirit (PMS) and 2,420 pieces of used tyres.
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