We are in the strangest of times and criminality is getting sophisticated and unconventional each day. The Nigeria Customs Service just intercepted containers with live snakes, geckos, millipedes, hairy frogs and spiders, not the usual contrabands or ammunitions.
The interception of the scary and weird animals was disclosed by the Customs Area Comptroller in charge of Calabar Free Trade Zone, Cross River and Akwa Ibom Command, Mrs. Nanbyen Burromvyat. She said three consignments containing 140 species of snakes and 600 animals, made up of geckos, millipedes, hairy frogs and spiders were confiscated.
The items were said to have been imported from Cameroon and were intercepted by officers on July 24, 2017, on arrival at the NIWA jetty, with a market value of N6.9 million.
Burromvyat said the consignments, which were Lagos-bound, were prohibited items, under Schedule 3 of the Revised Import Prohibition List (Trade) in the Common External Tariff.
A list of the items contained in the packaging list had snakes such as Atheris squamigera, Bitis gobanica, Dasypeltis ssp, Boiga pulverinata, among others, while the geckos were Hemidactylus frenatus and Hemidactylus fasciatus.
