Palliatives: Nigeria Customs Service turn down rice rejected by Oyo state government

Segun Showunmi in Ibadan

The Nigeria Customs Service, (NCS) Oyo/Osun States Command have refused to take back the rejected 1,800 bags rice by the Oyo State Government, declaring, its not the responsibility of the command to do that.

Penpushing reports that Public Relations Officer for the Commands, Abiola Abdullahi-Lagos made the declaration on Thursday, and advised the Oyo State Government to contact the customs headquarters in Abuja over the proposed return of the rice’.

“If they communicate to the headquarters, probably the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and we get a directive or an order to receive the rice, fine and good. But, yesterday (Wednesday), we never received any directive to receive the rice.”

“And there is no way we could collect the rice back. And mind you, the rice we issued out were good, not bad rice. It’s not that they were humiliated, no. I was the one that attended to them when they came, politely I told them the reason why the rice will not be received, that we have not received any order to receive the rice. And like I said, the rice that we issued out were good ones, and if there is any directive to collect the good rice we will do it.”

Penpushing further reports that Abdullahi-Lagos insisted that before the bags of rice were loaded, the officials of the Oyo state government were present and inspected the rice before loading process commenced.

The customs spokesman said it was not true that the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration Control (NAFDAC) was actually invited to test and certify that the rice distributed to Oyo state government was fit for consumption.

The Customs Command, however, explained that before the rice were loaded and distributed, top officials of the federal ministry of Agriculture, Oyo, Osun and Ekiti states duly tested and certified that the rice were good.

‘This clarification laid to rest the argument between the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar- Faruoq and the NAFDAC Director General , Professor Mojisoluwa Adeyeye on the 1800 bags of rice distributed to Oyo state by the federal government as palliatives on the Covid-19 pandemic’.

‘Before now, the Minister had insisted that the rice were duly tested and certified by NAFDAC, in her reply to a claim by NAFDAC Director General, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye that the rice
distributed to Oyo and other states were not tested and certified for human consumption by NAFDAC’.

“The officials of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture led by its Permanent Secretary, top officials of Oyo state government duly inspected and certified the rice before onward distribution to Oyo state government.”

Penpushing reports that, the command  emphasized that the decision to distribute the rice came from the headquarters, and the decision to receive the rice back would also come from the headquarters, recalling that, the officials of the Ministry of Agriculture, led by the Permanent Secretary and other government officials from Oyo, Osun and Ekiti states were on ground when the consignments were brought

”They came with their own team to inspect and certify the same rice and they said they were okay. They were there when the loading process started and ended. We also have representatives of Osun and Ekiti state governments. They never complained that the rice were not good, its after that, they decided to do otherwise. The other states of Osun and Ekiti, who also collected these rice never complained, except Oyo that complained that the rice were not good”, he said.