Customs denies killing five travellers over bags of rice

By Dapo Olawuni

Nigeria Customs Service, Federal Operations Unit Zone D has denied allegation of killing five travellers along the Ningi – Kano Road in Bauchi on Sunday.

The service denied social media posts alleging that its officers caused deaths of five travellers while chasing bags of rice.

Reacting to the tweets, Customs Public Relations Officer for Federal Operations Unit Zone D, Isah Suleiman, described the allegation as misleading and mischievous

Suleiman, an Assistant Superintendent of Customs disclosed in a statement ,that the customs authorities had gone to find out exactly what happened and discovered that its operatives were not within the accident scene or caused it..

Suleiman’s reaction was after a twitter user with account name @KNingi had tweeted about the accident, blamed Customs for the deaths and attempted drawing attention of other users to the tweet.

Suleiman said in the statement that “The attention of the Nigeria Customs Service Federal Operations Unit Zone ‘D’ Bauchi was drawn to a misleading tweets by @KNingi on his tweeter handle purporting that Officers of the @CustomsNG yesterday along
Ningi-Kano road attack a driver carrying bags of rice incidentally resulted to
the death of about 5 passenger’s including my friend reporter of @daily_trust Bashir Musa Liman” misleading the public that the operatives of the Nigeria Customs Service have a hand in the accident that caused lost
of lives.

” This story is mischievous, misleading and false in its entirety. As responsible operatives of Government our heart and prayers goes to the families of the deceased.

“We pray the Almighty Allah to grant the deceased Aljannatul-Firdausi. However, it is very important to keep the record of the unfortunate accident straight by stating that there was no operative of the Nigeria Customs Service on that road in question on that fateful day.

” Immediately after reading the misleading tweet, we began to find out what
actually happened; eyes witnesses including a brother of one of the deceased has clearly shown that the operatives of the Nigeria Customs Service were never associated with the accident since there was none on that road.

” Every narration revolved around over speeding and attempt to overtake which led
to the fatal accident. We also gathered that One (1) of the vehicles involved
in the accident was carrying some bags of rice and some people thought it
could have been operatives of the NCS that caused the accident” he said

The tweet reads “Officers of the @CustomsNG yesterday along Ningi-Kano road attack a driver carrying bags of rice incidentally resulted to the death of about 5 passenger’s including my friend reporter of @daily_trust Bashir Musa Liman”