With chants of “bring back our rice,” scores of traders at the Sango-Ota Market Thursday appealed to the Ogun State Governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, to help retrieve their seized bags of rice from the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS).
Some of the aggrieved traders, who stripped Unclad, mounted a human blockade at the main entrance of the Governor’s Office, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta, demanding his immediate intervention.
Customs operatives from the Federal Operations Unit, Ikeja, Lagos had in the early hours of Wednesday raided the Sango-Ota market, carting away thousands of bags of rice and jerry cans of vegetable oil.
Miffed by the seizure, which they described as “injustice,” hundreds of rice sellers and youths barricaded the Abeokuta-Lagos Expressway in protest and paralysed traffic and commercial activities for about 14 hours.
Some of the traders, under the aegis of Sango Marketers Association, stormed Amosun’s office Thursday and called for his intervention over the alleged invasion by the Customs men.
They were armed with placards bearing different inscriptions such as “Customs bring back our rice;” and “Our rights are being trampled upon by Customs officers of FOU, Ikeja,” among others.
The rice sellers, who were led by their coordinator, Alhaja Wakilat Salako, said some of the affected traders have been hospitalised due to the huge losses suffered from the raid.
Salako said 4,200 bags of rice were taken away by the law enforcement agents contrary to earlier reports that 18,000 bags were carted away.
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