CUSTOMS AND THE HIGHWAYS EXTORTION IN EKITI.

CUSTOMS AND THE HIGHWAYS EXTORTION IN EKITI.

As a federal agency, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has a duty to patrol the borders and prevent illegal goods from entering the country. However, the NCS has become notorious for raiding hotels and car lots to impound cars without proper documentation. This controversial culture has now extended to the highways, where operatives mount illegal checkpoints, particularly around Ekiti State, and extort motorists under the guise of examining vehicle duty payment papers.

I have fallen victim to this notoriety, and my son suffered the same fate today. Customs officials staged a roadblock around the Ifaki/Ido road, stopping vehicles and extorting money from motorists. One of the cars I sent to convey my son from Kwara State (Ilorin) to Ado Ekiti was intercepted around the Ifaki area. The customs men claimed that the import duties paid on the vehicle were short of about N5 million and threatened to impound the car if the money wasn't paid. This was despite the vehicle being legally cleared within the Nigerian Port, with all custom papers duly signed.

My son and the driver were harassed, and after all said and done, N250,000 was eventually paid in cash to the custom officials. I have all the necessary evidence of payment, as the customs officials refused transfer payments, insisting on cash only. 

All attempts to reason with me over the phone when I asked my son to let me speak with the custom men were rebuffed. They were delayed until my boy and the driver looked around to search for a POS transaction in order to convert the money I sent to them to cash. 

As a federal agency, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has a responsibility to patrol the borders and prevent illegal goods from entering the country, not harassing innocent Nigerians on inter state roads. That was an outcome of court judgment  against the custom authority in 2013, 2015, 2019, and 2021.

The harassment the citizens of this country are going through in the hands of security agencies is far becoming unbearable, and the government both at the state and the federal levels needs to do something fast about this. We are going through a lot in our own land. This cannot continue this way.

I am ADL.