Smugglers Suffer Huge Losses as Buhari Confirms Benin, Nigeria Border Closure

Smugglers Suffer Huge Losses as Buhari Confirms Benin, Nigeria Border Closure

Smugglers continued to suffer huge losses Wednesday as President Muhammadu Buhari in Yokohama, Japan confirmed the closure of Nigeria’s border with Republic of Benin, saying the measure was taken to stem the tide of smuggling of rice into the country.

The border had been shut last week although the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) had told THISDAY wednesday that the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), which is coordinating the ongoing joint border security exercise, did not close the borders.

But Buhari at a meeting with President of Benin Republic, Mr. Patrice Tallon, on the sidelines of the ongoing seventh Tokyo International Conference for Africa Development (TICAD7) in Yokohama, explained that the border was shut by the federal government as a decisive measure to curb smuggling of foreign rice into the country.

With the ban on movement of goods and services across the borders, THISDAY gathered that N21.6 million daily revenue, and N16.5 million daily revenue generated by the NCS along Idi-Iroko and Seme borders respectively are under threat. The figures exclude revenues from other three sectors comprising the North-west, North-central and South-south geopolitical zones, which were not readily available as at press time.

The NCS had told THISDAY earlier yesterday that the border was not closed, saying that what was going on was the resolve of Nigerian security agencies to better secure the country’s territorial integrity particularly the land and maritime borders against trans-border crime and criminality.

The meeting between Buhari and Tallon, which held behind closed doors at the Royal Park Hotel, was attended by Nigeria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Geoffrey Onyeama.