The Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, Nasir Sani-Gwarzo, has regretted the alleged extortion of transporters nationwide by security agents, stating that the development was obstructing seamless delivery of relief materials to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
He spoke yesterday in Abuja while receiving briefs from the Emergency Operation Centre of the Committee on Sustainable Production and Delivery of Essential Commodities During COVID-19 domiciled in the ministry.
The permanent secretary, who is also the supervisor of the panel, noted: “The Emergency Operation Centre has so far received 55 cases across the country, 54 of which have been resolved at the committee level. Sixty-eight per cent of these interventions are logistics-related, and about 20 per cent are market intelligence issues where supply and demand were paired to keep production afloat, while other requests had to do with direct manufacturing operations and some requests were retail-related.”