The leadership and members of the Abia State Chapter of the Cocoa Association of Nigeria (CAN) have threatened to relocate their businesses from the state to neighbouring states.

Members of the association who spoke to journalists in Umuahia, the state capital, called on the governor of the state, Dr. Alex Otti to disband the Cocoa Monitoring Team that he recently set up.

The Cocoa Monitoring Team was accused of extorting its members, which the group claimed was negatively affecting their businesses in the state.

The group in a statement signed by its Chairman, Mr. Johnson Chidi-Uche, also urged the state government to set up a panel of inquiry to probe and investigate the activities of members of the monitoring team whom they accused of sabotaging the activities of the state government to create a more conducive atmosphere for businesses to thrive.

CAN while praying the state government to compel some members of the monitoring team to include Mrs. Sarah Uzochukwu (Secretary), Mr. Enoch Eke Kalu (Chairman), and Chibunna Osondu Nkwocha whose accounts the team allegedly collected over N1.8 million from their members.

According to the group, trouble started when the members of the monitoring team came up with some alien guidelines that mandated cocoa merchants to obtain approval from the team before loading their products.

He revealed that the new guidelines reportedly masterminded by Uzochukwu, were introduced during a meeting of the monitoring team on October 30, adding that CAN and other relevant stakeholders in the Cocoa business in the state were not invited to the meeting.

Chidi-Uche, pointed out that in a bid to enforce the obnoxious guidelines even after CAN asked it to be reviewed, the monitoring team resorted to using security agencies to extort, intimate, and embarrass cocoa merchants in the state.

The statement reads, ?The main duty of the cocoa monitoring team in all the cocoa producing states is to prevent smuggling of cocoa out of the states.

?They check the produce papers to know if the necessary fees were paid into the state government?s account. Ensure that the consignment has an evacuation check test certificate issued by the Produce Department Ministry of Trade and Investment.

?They build check posts at border routes to ensure that the cocoa is graded. The cocoa monitoring team has no business going from one warehouse to another, extorting money from the cocoa merchants.

?It is the constitutional duty of the state produce department to grade all cocoa, collect all necessary fees and issue receipts, seal the cocoa bags, and issue evacuation check test certificates, before the cocoa is lifted out of the state.

?The present cocoa monitoring team was inaugurated by the Deputy Governor on 18th October 2024. They held their inaugural meeting on 30th October 2024, without inviting the major key stakeholders, CAN & CFAN. That was when they came out with what they called ?Produce Modalities for the 2024 cocoa season. This was masterminded by Mrs. Sarah Uzochukwu, the secretary of the monitoring team.? (The Nation)

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