Customs Impounds 64 Vehicles, Smuggled Rice Values at N1.6bn

The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Federal Operations Unit (FOU), Zone A, Ikeja, Lagos, has announced that it intercepted 22 truckloads of foreign parboiled rice with 64 units of vehicles smuggled into the country from neighbouring countries.

Customs Area Controller (CAC), Federal Operations Unit, Zone A, Muhammed Uba Garba disclosed this while parading newsmen around the seized items in the warehouses.

The rice, according to the CAC, has a Duty Paid Value (DPV) of N164million while the vehicles have a value of N1.3billion.

He said: “After intensifying our operational modalities to meet up with the current smuggling tactics most espe- cially as the Yuletide draws closer, we have intercepted contraband with a Duty Paid Value (DPV) of over N1.6billion.

“The seized items include 64assorted vehicles (mostly brand new), 13,333 bags of foreign parboiled rice (that’s like 22 trailers), 1,390 cartons of frozen poultry products, 835 jerrycans of vegetable oil, 15 parcels of Indian hemp, 1,101 pieces of used tyres, 205 bales of used clothing among others.”

Garba stated that the service would enforce federal govern- ment policy on importation of vehicles and rice through the land borders to encourage local production.

“We need to support the federal government policy on rice, encourage local rice farmers, the millers and patronise our nutritional rice,” he said.