Politics Melaye, Other Senators Fume Over 'Breach Of Protocol' By Customs Boss, Hammed Ali At NCS HQ

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Nigerian Senators on Monday fumed at the Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) retired Colonel Hameed Ali over alleged breach of protocol.

A Senate ad-hoc committee chaired by Senator Dino Melaye (APC, Kogi) was at the Customs headquarters in Abuja on oversight visit.

Melaye said protocol demanded that Ali received them at the entrance of the NCS’s headquarters.

“Let me make these small remarks on what we have just observed here in form of breach of protocols. Mr CG, rather than meeting us here at the conference room by way of courtesy, you supposed to have met us at the ground floor on arrival into the premises.

“That has been the practice of statutory bodies headed by Chief Executive Officers like you. Relevant senate committees have over the years been accorded this by bosses of Immigration Service, Prisons Service etc, making us to wonder why it is not so here today under your leadership,” Melaye said.

Responding, Ali said “We have our own protocol as regards receiving visitors like you. I don’t need to come downstairs to receive you just as nobody in the Senate or House of Representatives has ever come out to receive us anytime we visit the National Assembly.

“So, there is no breach of protocol for not coming down to welcome you since appropriate officers have been assigned to do so.

“Our protocol is our protocol and should be allowed to be. In fact, by way of etiquette, it is the committee that supposed to come to my office first on arrival and not just coming straight to the conference room,” he said.

He pledged to cooperate with the lawmakers in their assignment.

This is coming almost 10 months after the lawmakers engaged Ali over his refusal to wear Customs uniform. The matter was later settled out of sight.
 

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