President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has directed Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to return all the grains seized in their possession to their rightful owners for sale in local markets.
Tinubu makes this announcement in a stakeholders’ meeting held in Kwangwalam, a border town in the Maiadua Local Government Area of Katsina State, as disclosed by Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, the Comptroller-General of Customs (CGC), on Saturday.
According to Bashir Adeniyi, the directive of President Tinubu was aimed at ensuring that Nigerians have easy access to affordable food, emphasizing it as a significant step toward promoting food security in the nation.
In addition, Adeniyi established the President instruction that, the returned confiscated food items must be sold exclusively within Nigerian markets.
Adeniyi shed more light on the rationale behind the directive, said, “The whole idea is to promote food security and ensure that Nigerians will not be battling with hunger, and Mr. President considers this as one of the strategies that can help address the problem of food security.”
While addressing the issue of seized food items on the domestic market, Adeniyi revealed, “We have over 120 trucks of food items for export seized, which means a lot of food items were taken out of our markets, leading to the unavailability that created some pressure on the prices of these food items. So, we hope that by the time we restock our markets, it will have some positive effects on the prices.”
Adeniyi, during his visit, also met with former President Muhammadu Buhari in his country home and conferred with the Emir of Daura, Dr. Umar Farouq Umar, in his palace.
The Emir bestowed upon CGC Adeniyi the traditional title of Mabudin Hausa, in recognition of his contributions to the nation.
