Comptroller General of Customs Reads Riot Act to Bonded terminals Operators, Importers, Other Stakeholders
By Ovie Edomi
The search for safety of lives, protection of public health, maintaining regulatory compliance within the international trade environment has made, Adewale Adeniyi, MFR, the Comptroller General of Customs to read Riot Act to bonded terminals Operators, Importers and other Stakeholders in Lagos at the weekend, insisting that Bonded Terminals used by fraudulent importers and agents to import and clear dangerous and prohibited goods may have their licenses revoked henceforth.
Comptroller General of Customs, Adewale Adeniyi, said this during the exhibition and handing over to the Director General of NAFDAC, 25 seized containers were that laden with unregistered and prohibited pharmaceutical products. The Containers were intercepted by Compt Babatunde Olomu, PhD, fsi, the Apapa Customs Area Command controller and his Officers.
The seizures, with an aggregate Duty Paid Value of Nine Billion, Two Hundred and Thirty-Five Million, Four Hundred and Two Thousand, Nine Hundred and Seventy-Three Naira (N9,235,402,973.00).
Adeniyi also stated that henceforth, no containerised pharmaceutical products will be stemmed to any of the Bonded Terminals to forestall the risk of using them to bring adulterated Pharmaceutical products into Nigeria. He noted that only Apapa the nation’s premier seaport, PTML, Onne and MMA will be used to bring in Pharmaceutical products henceforth. Accordingly he disclosed that at the Premier Customs Seaport Command, Intelligence reports have revealed that some of the terminals were used to clear ‘bad jobs’, noting that three of them have been caught in the act.
The Customs boss revealed that out of three Bonded terminals, the Customs has recovered N500m and N1.5 billion respectively from two of the bonded terminals for under payments. Furthermore, he told news men that
Customs is reviewing Bonded terminals’ operations including bonded terminals licence fees which has been the same for over a decade.
Meanwhile the Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service, Adewale Adeniyi, who described the people involved in bringing fake drugs into Nigeria as Merchants of death stated that the 25 containers comprise 21 forty-foot containers and 4 twenty-foot containers contain predominantly unregistered pharmaceutical products including sexual enhancement drugs such as REDSUN and HYEGRA sildenafil citrate products, codeine-containing cough syrups including CSC brands, antibiotic injections like oxytetracycline and artesunate, pain relief medications containing diclofenac sodium and paracetamol, skin lightening creams marketed as GBOGBONISE and SKIN CHEMIST, hip and breast enlargement products, and various tablets bearing fake NAFDAC registration numbers.
The seizures also include expired food products such as margarine and chocolate, veterinary medications including albendazole bolus tablets, antimalarial drugs like artepham-artequick, and consumer goods such as crusader soap, reflecting a sophisticated and diversified contraband portfolio that poses significant threats to
public health, consumer safety, and regulatory integrity.
According to Adeniyi, the operational synergy they have developed with NAFDAC reflects strategic collaboration at its finest, with the Director-General providing critical intelligence even at midnight about suspicious importations that prove decisive to their anti-smuggling operations. Hence the CGC averred that the MOU-facilitated coordination which was signed in November 2024 enables swift responses to emerging threats, and he commended the Director-General and her dedicated team for their technical expertise, combined with their enforcement capabilities, that has created a formidable barrier against criminal networks seeking to compromise the nation’s borders.
The Comptroller General of Customs also noted that intelligence-led enforcement strategy and real-time collaboration with other regulatory agencies, have helped fundamentally to enhance and transform their operational capabilities.
It would be recalled that the Customs also handed over siezed Pharmaceutical products to NAFDAC three months ago in its continued efforts to eradicating fake drugs.
According to the Customs boss, “As a Service, we remain committed to making our seaports, airports, and land borders impenetrable barriers against smuggling operations”
While the seizure remains a tragedy to the Merchants of death, many of them are yet to come to terms with the fact that Comptroller Babatunde Olomu, the Area Customs Controller in charge of Apapa Customs Command has said it wont be business as usual and he has equally vowed to follow the Adewale Adeniyi led Customs service in line with the set rules. No wonder the CGC while commending the Apapa Customs Area Controller, Compt Babatunde Olomu and his team noted that the NCS would not compromised the nation’s Health security.
No doubt, Wale Adeniyi is getting his men more involved in the war against sophisticated network of criminal enterprises that want to compromise national health security. The outcome of the war against false declaration and under payment is that the Customs inter- Agency Collaboration is producing measurabe results especially under the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration