Bags of rice smuggled as corpses in ambulance

LAGOS—Smugglers operating at the Badagry-Seme border tried a fast one on operatives of the Nigeria Customs by packaging smuggled rice as dead bodies.

The mobile patrol team leader, Chief Superintendent of Customs, Mr. Ozah M., said the team noticed the frequency with which the said ambulance was patronising the international route with the ‘dead body,’ a development they thought was becoming alarming. They stopped the ambulance, a Volvo with number plates DV 74 EKY, for proper examination. The ambulance was discovered to be carrying eleven bags of imported rice that was carefully arranged and wrapped as corpses, leading to the arrest of a suspected smuggler, Mr. Moses Degbogbahun, who brought in the commodity. The management of Seme Command, however, warned that no amount of smuggling antics along Seme border route will go undetected by the eagle eyes of officers and men of the Command. The Command’s Public Relations Officer, Mr. Taupyen Selchang, said the suspect was still undergoing investigation for possible prosecution.