
Seme Command of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has announced that it has generated One Billion, Three Hundred and Twenty Million, Five Hundred and Eighty Two Thousand, Nine Hundred and Thirty Seven Naira, Fifty Seven Kobo (#1,320,582,937.57k) as at the close of work on Thursday July 20, 2023.
The Customs Area Controller of the Command, Dera Nnadi, who declared this at during a meeting with stakeholders at the Seme-Krake Border Command said the amount translates to 67 per cent of the One Billion, Nine Hundred and Sixty Million Naira (N1, 960,000,000.00) 2023 revenue target given to the Command..
According to him, the collection for the corresponding year of 2022 was Nine Hundred and Seventeen Million, Seven Hundred and Eighty Eight Thousand, Three Hundred and Twenty Nine Naira and Twenty Eight Kobo (N917,788,329.28k).
Nnadi highlighted that on anti-smuggling activities, the Command has seized Six Million dollars ($6,000,000.00) worth of fake notes amounting to over Two Billion, Seven Hundred Million Naira (#2,700,000,000.00) in local currency.
He further highlighted that other seizures over the period of January to June this year include: 6,569 bags of foreign parboiled rice with a duty paid value (DPV) of over Two Hundred and Fifteen Million, Nine Hundred and Seven, One Hundred and Seventy One Naira (#215,907,171.00).
Also seized over the period are the equivalents of 12 petroleum tankers worth of petroleum products with a DPV of Six Hundred and Eighty Million, Two Hundred and Sixty Three Thousand, Two Hundred and Seventy One Naira (#680,263,271.00) only.
The duty paid value (DPV) of all the seized items over the period according to the Seme Command CAC is One Billion, Fifteen Million and One Hundred and Seventy Three Thousand, Five Hundred and Eighty Seven Naira (#1,015,173,587.00) only.
Speaking further he said the potential in doing business among the over 428 million people within the West African sub-region is enormous and should be fully exploited as trade within the Lagos-Abidjan corridor accounts for about 75 per cent of all trade within the sub-region while noting that common trade among this region ranks fourth among all African regions trading with each other.