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By Steve Agbota
A boat operated by smugglers conveying several jerry cans of petroleum products for smuggling has ran aground at Seme Beach while approaching the Republic of Benin.
Customs Area Controller, Seme Command of the Nigeria Customs Service, Compt Dera Nnadi who made this known to newsmen, said that officials of the Nigerian Navy and Nigerian Immigration Service, removed the boat and the jerry cans.
While Nigeria is battling with scarcity of petroleum products and hike in price of the PMS, smugglers have continued to transport the commodity to neighboring countries of Benin, Togo, Chad, Niger among other countries.
Nnadi vowed that under his watch, smuggling activities through the Seme borders would be crushed.
Just recently, the command intercepted 553 parcels of canabis sativa worth N10 million. The command also recently handed over fake dollar bills worth $6 million which was intercepted at the border to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
The Comptroller added that the Command is also adopting new strategies in line with the ECOWAS protocol to boost trade facilitation. He said that the Command has achieved huge success in the first quarter of 2023, as it facilitated 425 trucks with fees amounting to N314, 720, 938.7.
Also, the command assessed 412 baggage declarations with duty amounting to N58,844,382.
He stated that the items imported include food products and beverages produced within the sub-region, while for export, the Command was able to intercept 1,243 trucks bearing 40,096.47 metric tons of made-in-Nigeria cargo declared on 165 Single Administrative Documents with Free On Board value of N4,291,322,887.19 and National Export Supervision Scheme Fees of N21,456,551.83.
“During the same period in 2022, 3006 trucks bearing 116,053.9 metric tons of cargo with FOB value of N6,597, 506, 993.28 with NESS Fee of N32,989,006.16 was recorded – and this, regrettably contains a shortfall in export to the tune of 75,000 metric tons of cargo due to competition between Dangote Cement and competitors in the cement market at Togo.” he added.
He said that the Command had also used other sources of generating revenue through auction sales of seized items especially petroleum products and other perishable items – which prompted them to generate the sum of N350,099,541.71 in the first quarter of 2023.
