Home Security Insecurity: Oyo Assembly Members Visit Nigerian Customs, Seek Cooperation

Insecurity: Oyo Assembly Members Visit Nigerian Customs, Seek Cooperation

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...members of Oyo House with officers and men of the Nigerian Customs...during the visit...
...members of Oyo House with officers and men of the Nigerian Customs...during the visit...

The Oyo State House of Assembly has paid a courtesy visit to the Nigerian Customs Service headquarters in the state seeking support towards tackling insecurity and further create a working relationship.

Speaking on Tuesday in Ibadan at the Oyo/Osun Customs area command headquarter, the Speaker of the Oyo State House of  Assembly, Hon. Adebo Ogundoyin noted that the visit is to create synergy with Nigerian customs to achieve governmental goals in the area of security and border protection.

According to Ogundoyin, there are 32 lawmakers from local governments and constituencies across the state willing to work with the Nigerian customs and other securities agencies to ensure residents are protected and their properties are safe.

He said, “the main thing we are here to do is to familiarize ourselves with the Nigerian customs, towards forming an inclusive government as promised by our administration during electioneering.

“We are aware that as law enforcement agency, in the process of carrying out your duties, you make lots of enemies. But still, the role of the customs and other agencies cannot be overemphasis.

“We are the closest people to the grassroot and our role is to uphold the rule of law. We know our people and we can talk to the stakeholders towards achieving a peaceful and prosperous Oyo State.”

While receiving the lawmakers, the customs area Comptroller, Oyo/Osun Area command, Comptroller Zilkifilu Abdullahi noted that aside generating revenue for the federal government, it is the duty of the agency to minimize inflow of smuggling, prevent smugglers activities and illegal importation of arms into the country.

He appealed to the lawmakers to support the agency by enlightening the residents on the danger involved in illegal importations.

“We know we can only try our best, because there are places we cannot cover that is why we are pleading with the lawmakers to enlighten their people more.

“People importing arms illegally and you pretend not to see them, what if the arms are eventually used to murder your relative or someone close?

“People import expired rice, vegetable oil and other food items; they import used pants and bras, which can cause health disaster.

“Sometimes communities are hostile to us and we have to avoid some operations where we believe it may cause casualties. We believe with the state support, our operations will be more efficient,” he added.

Speaking on neglected border communities, Abdullahi noted lot of communities in the state lack good roads and need government attention.

He said, “This is not limited to Oyo State, because the case of neglecting rural communities especially border towns is across the country.

“They lack most basic amenities including good road, pipe water and the government needs to do something about it.

“Our own challenge as Nigerian customs is mobility in Oyo state, we always assist other sister agencies in security operations but our patrol vehicles are aging.”

Abdullahi, however, warned against fraudsters who are using Nigerian customs identity to extort money from Nigerians in the name of custom auction.

“For now, items like rice and vegetable oil are not on auction, instead we are usually directed to donate them to Internal Displaced People’s, (IDPs) camp.

“Vehicles are only auctioned on the custom website and it has guidelines, so I appeal to Nigerians not to entertain fraudsters running auction programmes on behalf Nigerian Customs,” he added.

Packaged by Kunle Gazali

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