Seme: Jibo Still Giving Petrol And Drug Barons A Run For Their Money

By Stephen Ubanna

Between December 2021 and now, Bashir Mohammed Jibo, Comptroller,Seme Command  of the Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, had made the Creeks and Beaches , along the Seme Jurisdictions and Badagry axis,  a nightmare  for Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, popular, Petrol, and drugs  smugglers.

The Seme Customs Area Comptroller who had successfully repositioned the Command Operations and Patrol Teams, has also tightened up security and surveillance at the Creeks and Beaches, p. It was not surprising why the Petrol and Drug smugglers, are finding it difficult  to to carry out their nefarious activities without playing into Jibo’s men whose anti-smuggling personnel are everywhere at the Seme and Badagry axis.

Indeed, the Seme Customs boss from the onset had made it clear to those engaged in illegal trading activities that they are going to face much difficulty including losing their Contraband goods to government if they failed to change. 

Many of them, who believe that the Customs Comptroller  will not seized their goods without the information filtering out to them  through their insider sources may have been disappointed  when they  began to see faces in the Operations Unit, who were not known to them to Compromise by using third parties to do so.

With the matching Order given to one Assistant Coptroller Abubakar, overseeing the Command Operations Unit and the Patrol Team Leaders, to sit  up and ensure that no Contraband  enters or leaves the country, may have the  Operation and Patrol Team Leaders and their Officers to be more more aggressive  in their  routine checks on vehicles  coming into the country from the neighbouring West African country of Benin Republic.

 While many of the Petrol smugglers, particular, have  had a bleak Christmas  as they could not succeed in smuggling hundreds of Jerry cans of Petrol, of 25 , litres , each to  Benin, the situation may not have changed this new year. This is because Comptroller Jibo’s anti-smuggling Officers, who have dominated the Seme Jurisdictions and its environs  have inflicted more  pains and agonies, on the Petrol smugglers and Indian Hemp smugglers, particular, as they have continued to lose their investments , which runs into millions of  naira.

The daring Petrol and drug smugglers may have felt at the back of their minds that Jibo’s Patrol Team Officers had relaxed after the Christmas and therefore, an opportunity to go back to doing what they know best: smuggling of imported subsidized Petroleum products meant for the Nigerian market to the  Benin Republic market  for their own pecuniary gain.

 In turn, they may have zeroed in to smuggling into the country from the West African country of Ghana produced Indian Hemp or iported cocain from the South American Country of Brazil, through the Autonomous port of Benin, Cotonou , Bollore port, or any other port in the West African sub-region as transit cargo into Nigeria, described as the largest economy in Africa.  

  Only recently, the Command made a seizure of 11.913 kg of item suspected to be cocaine which was said to have been concealed with religious books. The suspected drug was said to have been discovered in a cross –border vehicle during a normal ‘’routine stop and search exercise around the Badagry area’’. There are indications that the 11 parcels of cocain smuggler may have pushed into the country either through the Creeks or any of the Beaches around Badagry axis, but the smugglers could not beat the Customs personnel to it.

The Customs Comptroller may have been convinced that it was cocain when a sample   was handed over to Nurudeen Audu, the the Head, National agency For Food And Drug Administration, NAFDAC, at the Seme Joint Border Community who took it to the aency’s Lagos Laboratory office for test and verification to ascertain the type of drug The NAFDC officials, after their Laboratory analysis, were aid to have found it to be cocain weighing 11.913kg with the estimated street value of N3,916,624147.00.

The Command during the period was said have also intercepted 1,065 Jerrycans of Petrol of 25 litres each, equivalent 31,950 Litres  or a tanker load of Petrol  along the Badagry Creeks.

 An appreciative Comptroller Jibo, accompanied  Audu, Head of NAFDAC,   at the Land Border and other  senior officers of the Command had inspected the seized Contraband  items. He was said to have also made the necessary report to the Lagos Zonal Office and to Hameed Ali, a retired Army Colonel and the Comptroller General. The Command Operation and Patrol Team s could go enter into the rugged Creeks to track the smugglers with the help of the new Hilux Vans, numbering four, provided by Ali, the Comptroller General to the Command.

 Hussaini Abdullahi, a Deputy Superintendent of Customs and the Command spokesperson, going by the valuation of the seized items by experts  had put the Duty Paid Value ,DPV, N10,041,198.00 The January 26, 2022, is largest  quantities of Petrol, that had been seized by the Command in the last two months. On January 12,  2022,  the Command  had intercepted 1,500 Jerry cans  of Petrol, of 25 litres each, equivalent of 31,500 litres  or a tanker load of petrol valued at about N7 million.

Last December,  the Command Operations Team, which had been on the neck of the Petrol smugglers, had intercepted  1,050 Jerry cans  of 30 litres each of Petrol each or 31,050, litres, which  many believe was also equivalent of a Tanker load of Petrol, worth about N N5.4 million, along the Seme and Badagry Creek.