The Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, has made it known that he supports FG’s decision to close the land borders with the neighbouring countries.
According to the Emir this is the only way through which Nigeria’s anti-smuggling laws could be enforced.
The Emir made this known in Kano on Wednesday while speaking with newsmen in his palace on the sideline of recent appointments into the National Economic Advisory Council by President Muhammadu Buhari.
“If you remember when the president came to Kano on official visit, I actually talk about closing the borders with the Republic of Benin. I always felt that if you really want to enforce laws that you have against smuggling, you need to close borders.
“You have petroleum products moving basically across the borders from Nigeria to neighbouring countries because of our fuel subsidies. You have goods coming in across the border using the port in Cotonou to avoid tax revenues in Lagos; so what happens is we don’t get the revenue from duties and tariffs and then we end up having the goods coming in anyway.
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“Closing the borders becomes indispensable because our neighbouring countries are not helping us to protect our economy. For instance, if you want to protect rice farmers, you have to impose heavy taxation on the importation of foreign rice into the country.
“Therefore, any country that allows smuggling of rice into Nigeria through its borders is doing that at the expense of our farmers who could not withstand competition with foreign producers. Besides rice and other food items, you must also understand that all the illicit drugs get into this country through the land borders.
“So sometimes it is important to take these difficult decisions so that we get the cooperation and collaboration of Customs officials across the borders. It is something that I wholeheartedly support. I think it is temporary and I think it will lead to improvement,” the monarch emphasised.
