Former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan has been accused of endangering the lives of Nigerians by importing substandard rice.
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The Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) thursday expressed concern over
the substandard rice imported into the country during the administration
of former President Goodluck Jonathan, lamenting that the rice is
sometimes harmful to the human system.
They said huge consignment of rice still finding its way into the
market was imported into Nigeria since 2014 when the Jonathan
administration issued a very liberal import licence regime to its
election financiers who were able to bring a substantial quantity of
rice into the country using a waiver from the presidency at the time.
The 36 governors spoke in a statement issued by the Head, Media and
Public Affairs of the NGF Abulrazaque Bello- Barkindo, which called on
the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to expeditiously take measures to
arrest the situation.
The governors claimed that while some bulk of the consignment was
stale, others were either rejected in other countries or had overstayed
in various warehouses before they found their way into Nigeria through
the activities of some unscrupulous elements.
While summoning the customs to shed light on the matter, the
governors expressed concern that Nigerians were either falling sick or
losing their lives to the consumption of these substandard produce even
though some states have commenced elaborate efforts to produce rice in
commercial quantity with a view to halting Nigeria’s over-reliance on
staples that can be produced locally.
The Governors, according to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
frowned at the situation where Nigerians snubbed locally-produced
commodity in preference for foreign ones which were most of the time,
stale, contaminated or even fake.
Meanwhile, in a brief to the governors’ forum, the NCS
Comptroller-General through the Deputy Comptroller-General, Dangaladima
Aminu, stated that although there is an upsurge in the smuggling of rice
through the nation’s land borders, there has been no alteration to the
prohibition on the importation of rice through Nigeria’s land borders
and that any quantity of rice which finds its way into Nigeria through
land routes was smuggled.
He noted that rice was usually smuggled into the country through
unauthorised border routes which span more than 4,000km and that the
smugglers were aided by border communities who alternated between
motorcycles, canoes and rafts to smuggle contraband rice into the
country.
Aminu added: “Your excellencies, it may interest you to note
that a motorcycle can make up to 30 trips with six 50kg bags of rice per
night depending on the distance and when the border communities are not
smuggling the produce themselves, they are aiding or providing cover
for smugglers.”
He, however, added that rice merchants had recorded huge losses as a
result of seizures by the customs. He disclosed that in 2014 customs
seized 12,000 metric tons of the commodity, 4,503 tonnes in 2015 and
14,000metric tons in 2016.
Aminu informed the governors that the customs “takes the issue
of smuggling of rice seriously, having identified the danger posed by it
to the economic well-being and health hazards it constitutes to the
Nigerian people.”
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