Bang Pleads With Ibrahim, Borno State Governor To Evacuate 5,600 Rice Allocation

By Ambrose Okehi

The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Western Marine Command has pleaded with the state governments as well as the authorities in  the Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs, Camps, to come and carry the bags of rice allocated to them by the Customs management which had been the Command  warehouse at Ibafon, between last  year and now.

 Boyilinyi Banga, the Comptroller of the Command, who made the appeal on Thursday, February 1, 2019, fears that items may spoil if the governors of the IDP  states did expedite action to remove rice allocations from the ware to create space for more Contraband seizures, it would pose a major problem for the Command.

Indeed, Customs formations nation-wide  have been expressing dissatisfaction with the various IDP states over their alleged delay in taking possession of their rice and other items allocation. Many believe that the governors of Borno, Adamawa, Yobe and Edo states, which were suppossed to make provision  for evacuation of these items, particular rice , rice, from Customs warehouse across the country  may have expected hameed Ali, a retired Colonel and Comptroller General , NCS, to deliver the items to the IDP Camps to make his job complete.

They may have gotten it wrong as Ali, is not ready to give any instruction to any Customs Comptroller to hire the trucks that would carry the rice allocations to IDP  Camps. Take for instance, the Borno state IDP camp which has  about 5,646 bags of 50kg foreign parboiled rice worth N124, 776 seized from water ways smugglers to evacuate from Western Marine warehouse.

A senior Customs officer who spoke to The Value News said kashim Ibrahim, the governor of Borno state may have to act fast to evacuate the rice allocation from the Western Marine Warehouse as Adamu Mohammed, a Deputy Comptroller of Customs  in-charge of the Command Enforcement Unit are daily making seizes of Contrabands , particular rice, from water ways smugglers which should caution the Borno governor that there is no time to waste or lose the allocation to a more serious organisation that needed the items.

The situation is even worse in Federal Operations Unit, Zone A, IKeja and Seme Command, where there are thousands of bags of 50 Kg  foreign parboiled rice  in their warehouses awaiting to be evacuated to the IDP Camps . The Commands patrol teams including the Headquarters’s Strike Force, HSF, Lagos Zonal Command, under the Command of Salisu Shuaibu, an Assistant Comptroller and his boys , according to sources have  continued to make rice seizures hat also needed to be evacuated to the IDP Camps.

Ali may have even made the job easier for  the states where the IDP Camps are situated for the governors take governors to take delivery of it with ease because of the arrangement with the Army Transport and Supplies to carry the items.