The Ogun State Area Command, Nigeria Customs Service, says it has intercepted 215 vehicles smuggled into the country through land borders in its operations between January and June 2018.
The Controller of the command, Michael Agbara, disclosed this on Wednesday at its Idiroko border office.
He also told journalists that the command has generated a total revenue of N2.6bn within the period under review.
Furthermore, in the last six months, other seizures made by the command according to Agbara included a total of 15,976 bags of foreign rice 50Kg each, 1,148 kegs of vegetable oil, 24 motorcycles, and 161 compressed packs of Indian hemp among others.
Agbara, also reviewing the activities of the command within the last one month, said it generated N393.5m, seized 37 smuggled vehicles and 3,000 bags of foreign rice among others.
He disclosed that concerning the seizure of rice, a particular truck intercepted around Mowe-Ibafo axis conveyed 600 bags packaged in branded bags of a local producer of rice, in order to beat the Customs’ operatives.
He said, “Ninety-nine out of these 600 bags were the local brand of the rice producer while 501 bags were smuggled foreign parboiled rice re-bagged by a local producer.
“They did this just to beat our operatives but our operatives were vigilant and were able to detect this.”
He, however, said three suspects had been arrested concerning some of the seizures.
