The Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, has intercepted a wildlife trafficker and confiscated from him 111 live wild African grey parrots he allegedly transported from the Republic of Cameroon to Nigeria.

The Adamawa/Taraba Area Command of the NCS which achieved the feat, said Wednesday that the suspect packed the parrots in six wooden boxes on his way from Cameroon through the Gurin international borderline in Fufore Local Government Area of Adamawa State.

The Customs Area Commander for Adamawa and Taraba States, Garba Bashir said at a press briefing in Yola that a ban was placed on dealings in African wild parrots due to drastic decline in their population largely because of rampant trade in them.

“Poaching methods are often brutal and a high percentage of captured birds die before even reaching export sites,” the controller said.

The confiscated parrots were handed over to the World Parrot Trust through representatives who attended the handover event.

The Adamawa/Taraba Customs Area Command similarly handed illicit drugs that it seized from smugglers to the Adamawa State Command of the Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA.

The area controller had in his interaction with newsmen disclosed that his command, in operations within the last three weeks, seized 5710×10 sachets of 100mg capsules of tramadol; 990×10 capsules of 50mg of tramadol and 185 packets of 5mg benzhexol tablets; all allegedly products of illicit drug trade but seized from smugglers.

Bashir also said his command confiscated 13,200 litres of petrol and 1,925 litres of diesel.

“These Petroleum products were packed in 528×25L and 77×25L jerry cans respectively, intended to be snuggled out of the country,” he explained.

According to the Adamawa/Taraba Customs Area Controller, for the period of three weeks in view, the command made 19 instances of assorted seizures with the monetary value of N67,785,358.

“The interceptions were made in different locations across the command’s frontiers,” he said, indicating however that locations in Adamawa State top them all.

https://dailypost.ng/2025/07/02/smuggling-customs-intercepts-111-live-african-parrots-15125-litres-of-petrol-diesel/