The Western Marine Command of the Nigeria Customs Service generated N1.1bn revenue last year as against the N129.5m of 2019, the Public Relations Officer, Isah Sulaiman, an Assistant Superintendent of Customs, stated at the weekend.
According to the statement made available to Financial Street, the Customs Area Controller in charge of the command, Olugboyega Peters, said, “The year 2020 witnessed the biggest achievement in the history of the Western Marine Command.”
He added that there was a change of baton in February 2020, for maximum and efficient operations.
“This led to the seizure of 81 different items from January to December 2020 with Duty Paid Value of N1,104,647,370 as against the DPV of N129,559,656.46 in 2019,” he added.
According to him, the round-the-clock patrol adopted by the command paid off.
His words, “These unprecedented seizures were made as a result of the strategies put in place in terms of 24 hours patrol, capacity building, surveillance, intelligence gathering, doggedness and determination of our operatives in making the zone unbearable for smugglers.”
Olugboyega, however, noted that the command had on April 24, 2020, seized over 10 tonnes of Indian hemp valued at over N1bn, which happened to be the biggest single item catch of marijuana in the history of NCS.
“This feat has received national and international commendation,” he said.
The WMC boss warned smugglers to desist from the nefarious act, adding that the command was ready to get them out of business.
“We want unscrupulous elements to know that there is no hidden place for them, and whatever their strategy, we will always be ahead of them. We will not rest on our oars in suppressing smuggling to the barest minimum,” he added.
