Customs seizes 61 SUVs with fake government plates

Officers from the Federal Operations Unit, Zone B of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) in Kaduna State have confiscated 61 smuggled Sports Utility Vehicles, textile products, and drugs, amounting to a total Duty Paid Value of N2.8 billion.

FOU Comptroller Dalha Wada, on Tuesday, reported that the impounded vehicles were seized from smugglers across different locations in the North-Central and North-West zones, as a result of the intelligence drive and improved strategies to raise the service’s operational performances.

Wada expressed concern over smugglers adopting new evasion tactics, including hiring bandits in the northern region and establishing illegal routes. In three months, the unit recorded 242 seizures involving 21 different items.

Notably, among the seized items were 61 SUVs bearing fake government plate numbers, a deceptive measure employed by smugglers to avoid detection at the nation’s borders in the North-West zone.

During a presentation for journalists, Wada labeled the smugglers as enemies of the country, emphasising the need to crush their activities by all means. He highlighted the alarming trend of smugglers collaborating with bandits to evade arrest.

The unit also impounded over 2,000 bags of foreign parboiled rice, cartons of vegetable oil, bales of foreign second-hand clothes and shoes, and drugs.

Wada handed over these items to the representative of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) for further prosecution.