The Eagle
Online, 7/29/17 —The Federal Government says it has commenced investigation to
uncover the importers of three consignments containing 140 species of snakes
and 660 other animals from Cameroon to Nigeria.
The Nigeria
Customs Service on July 26 intercepted three consignments containing 140
species of snakes and 660 other animals in Calabar, Cross River State.
The
Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, told newsmen
in Abuja on Friday that the Nigerian Agricultural Quarantine Service had been
directed to commence the investigation immediately.
Ogbeh
reiterated the need for officials of the NAQS to be stationed at the country’s
ports to enable them to address such issues before they escalated.
The
minister, who expressed the fear that if the quality of agricultural produce
imported into Nigeria was not checked, a sort of biological warfare could also
be launched against the country’s agricultural sector.
He said:
“It is very important to know the tendencies of saying that the quarantine
service should not be kept away from the ports.
“It is a
threat and a danger because the other day, somebody attempted to smuggle
kolanuts to Saudi Arabia.
“The
Saudis have told us not to bring kolanuts into their country.
“The
Quarantine Service had to go into the aircraft and stop the plane from leaving;
it then brought the kolanuts down and now, it is snakes.
“Our
ambition is to become a major agricultural nation, if the quality of what we
take out and that of the materials coming in are not known to us, anything can
happen.
“The
dangers include biological warfare, which can be launched against our
agriculture industry.
“These
are reasons why the quarantine service must be allowed to play its roles without
necessarily disrupting the ports’ routine functions.”
NAN
reports the containers were brought in aboard a Cameroonian vessel, ‘MV Flesh’,
through the Calabar waterway.
The
containers reportedly contained snakes and other animals such as geckos, millipedes,
hairy frogs and spiders.
No comments:
Post a Comment
You only need to enter your comment once! Comments will appear once they have been moderated. This is so as to stop the would-be comedian who has been spamming the comments here with inane and often offensive remarks. You know who you are!