The Port Harcourt II Area Command of Nigeria Customs Service, Onne port, Rivers State, said its men seized container loads of machetes and military wares, amongst other banned goods.
In a statement signed over the weekend by its image maker, Ifeoma Ojekwu, the command also said that it realised a total of N115.2 billion as revenue from January to June 2022.
“The 2022 half-year collection shows a remarkable difference from the N78bn collected in the first half of 2021 and N46.6bn collected in the same period of 2020.
“Further comparison indicates 147 per cent increase above the 2020 collection and 47 per cent increase above 2021 figure showing differences of N37,097,079,630.91 and N68,597,503,002.82 for 2021 and 2020 respectively.
“Under Comptroller Auwal Mohammed, the Customs Area Controller (CAC), the Command’s revenue collection showed upward progression on monthly basis resulting in the cumulative differences recorded for the three years juxtaposed.
“In the first half of 2022, the Command made 28 seizures comprising nine containers valued at N531,386,166.78 (duty paid value). This half year number of seizures is higher than 20 number made between January and June 2021.
“Amongst the seized items were machetes brought into the country without end-user certificate, military wears, vegetable oil, whisky, soap and used clothing.
“Other seizures recorded include used tyres, foreign parboiled rice, tomato paste, used vehicle parts and other items either classified as prohibited or for which duty payment were being evaded.
“For export, a total of 876,775.60 metric tonnes with $495,384,221.99 free on board (FOB) value translating into N203,969,499,562.18 and Nigeria Export Supervision Scheme (NESS) value of N1, 075,060,914.52 were processed through the command in the period under review.
“The above export figures are over a hundred and fifty (150) per cent increase in value to that of first half 2021,” the command said.
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