Following the failure and reluctance of the men of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) to return the bags of rice and other valuable goods allegedly carted away, while Ibadan Traders’ shops were burgled recently, Oyo Residents have urged the Senate President and other distinguished senators at the National Assembly to give no room for the customs’ officers giving preferential treatment to only Katsina traders whose goods were returned after they had been carted away.
The words of admonition came from Oyo residents shortly after the senators had instructed the men of the NCS to return all the goods seized from the traders in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
An Ibadan man, Zacchaeus Taiwo lamented that while Katsina traders’ goods were returned to the owners after they had been allegedly carted away by men of the NCS, no need to continue withholding the goods seized in Ibadan after the senators’ intervention had called for immediate returning of goods to the owners.
Taiwo stressed that men of NCS should not give preferential treatment to only Katsina traders, adding that the continued seizure of Ibadan traders’ goods at their disposal amounts to injustice and unfairness.
Another Ibadan man, Adewale Qassim said that an action taken by the customs officers to return the goods belonging to Katsina traders justifies that they only cared for the traders coming from the state at the expense of the ones in Ibadan, Oyo State.
Qassim stressed that the officer who led the Katsina’s shops’ raid had been dismissed, while the same decision has not been taken against the ones who led a similar raid on Ibadan markets.
He said that his thought was also in line with what others are saying that “men of NCS only returned the Katsina Traders’ goods because they are from President Muhammadu Buhari’s home state”.
A respondent who pleaded to speak on a condition of anonymity for the sake of retribution disclosed that men of NCS who carried out the dastardly and illegal activities should be brought before the temple of justice.
An anonymous respondent maintained that an action taken by them could make people resort to self-help and self-defence, while governments fail to do the needful.
He however enjoined the Senate President and distinguished senators to call the customs’ officers to order and avoid carrying out an act, which is an aberration to the act that established and sustains the agency.
