The Vice President, Kashim Shettima, has decorated the new Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service, Adewale Adeniyi, describing the appointment by President Bola Tinubu as a morale booster for officers in the service.
Shettima stated this on Monday in a brief ceremony witnessed by the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila at the Presidential Villa. According to the Vice President, “Congratulations for bringing professionalism back to the Nigerian Customs Service. Now, every Customs officer can aspire to occupy the pinnacle of his or her profession.
“I wish you well, on behalf of the President and Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces, Congratulations, once again,” the Vice President added.
Speaking to journalists shortly after the decoration ceremony, Adeniyi expressed gratitude to President Tinubu for appointing a serving officer as the head of the agency, assuring him and Nigerians of a more effective and innovation driven Customs Service.
He said “In the last eight years, the Nigeria Customs Service has gone through a period of transition. In some areas, we recorded progress – we made remarkable progress in E-Customs; we made a lot of breakthroughs in capacity building. But the Customs Service can still live to its full potential when we bring in more innovation to drive Customs operations. These are the kind of things we are looking at in the years ahead.”
Continuing, Adeniyi said “we are going to be professional in our approach, there are a number of key stakeholders that we are going to be working with, it is a very onerous task but we are going to be working alongside other stakeholders and partners that we have identified.
“We intend to come up with innovations that will carry along all partners and stakeholders. We are going to leverage technology and innovation to break new grounds in Customs operations.”