(Business in Cameroon) - On 26 July 2017, in Calabar, Cross River State, Nigerian customs officers intercepted three cargo of animals imported from Cameroon, bound for Nigeria, the Nigerian press revealed. The three cargo, we learned, were loaded aboard a vessel christened MV Flesh, and made of 140 snakes of different species and 660 other various animals.

To be clearly situated with regards to the people responsible for these imports, informs the same source, the Nigerian Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Audu Ogbeh, immediately announced having requested for an investigation to be carried out by the Nigerian Agricultural Quarantine Service (NAQS). According to Mr Audu, the Nigerian authorities are concerned that this type of import could be used as a mean to launch a “biological warfare” against the Nigerian agriculture.

 “Our ambition is to become a major agricultural nation. If the quality of our imports and that of the materials entering our territory is unknown, anything could happen. Possible dangers include biological warfare, which could be launched against our agricultural industry. This is the reason for which the quarantine service must be authorised to play its part, without necessarily disrupting the routine operations at the ports”, declared Mr Ogbeh.

As a reminder, Cameroon and Nigeria share a 1,500 km long land border, along which intense illegal activities are taking place, activities particularly dynamic in the three northern regions and the two Anglophobe regions of the country.

BRM