According to the Nigeria Customs Service, five individuals were detained in September while ammunition and other illegal goods with a duty-paid value of approximately N622 million were seized.
Speaking to reporters at the Federal Operations Unit on Wednesday, Hussein Ejibunnu, the acting customs area controller in charge of Zone A of the service’s Federal Operations Unit, said the unit also recovered N107m during the time period under consideration.
He claimed that the team discovered imported bales of used apparel abandoned in a Lagos building that was still under construction.
The team also discovered a sizable stash of Premium Motor Spirit during the period under review that was hidden inside sacks along the Badagry axis in Lagos State.
According to him, “Among the September seizures was a massive discovery of bales of 1,955 bales of used clothing in an abandoned building around the Lagos International Trade Fair Complex. We made the discovery and evacuation using combined strategies of intelligence, tact and enforcement. Also within the same period, a large cache of PMS ingeniously concealed inside sacks was intercepted at the Badagry Axis of Lagos State.
“Other seizures recorded within the same period are, “7,328 x 50kg bags of foreign parboiled rice, 121,550 litres of premium motor spirit, 68 cartons of frozen poultry, 37 crates of eggs used to conceal rice, 150 kg parcels of Indian hemp, 10 pieces of military Camouflage bags, Six units of used cars, I unit of pump action rifle, 2 units of locally made guns and 35 live cartridges. Five suspects were arrested in connection with some of the seizures mentioned above”
However, according to Ejibunnu, the Federal High Court rendered three decisions in the units’ favor, resulting in six convictions for illegal possession of smuggled items.
He also mentioned the dismissal of six civil lawsuits brought against the Unit.
