Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) on Tuesday October 3, 2023, arrested a 67-year-old drug trafficker, Clement Chukwuemeka, at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport (NAIA), Abuja, for allegedly ingesting 100 wraps of cocaine.
Also intercepted on the same day by NDLEA operatives at the Malam Aminu Kano International Airport (MAKIA), Kano, was a 45-year-old woman, Bilkisu Mohammed Bello, while preparing to board a Saudia Airlines flight to Saudi Arabia.
The arrests were made known by the NDLEA Director of Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, on Sunday, October 8.
Babafemi said that Chukwuemeka was arrested on during the inward clearance of passengers on Ethiopian Airlines flight 951 from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and taken for body scan, which revealed multiple pellets in his stomach.
While under observation, he excreted a total of 100 wraps of cocaine weighing 2.195 kilogrammes in four excretions.
During interrogation, the drug trafficker, Chukwuemeka, had claimed that he ventured into the criminal enterprise to raise enough money to marry a new wife and start life afresh after wasting 30 years of his life in Brazil, Ethiopia and Thailand.
In his statement, he claimed to have spent 30 years in Brazil, Ethiopia and Thailand, while he was once married, but lost his wife and without a child. He added that was why he decided to go into drug trafficking to raise enough money to marry a new wife and start life afresh.
The second suspect, Bilkisu, while being interviewed, confessed that pellets of cocaine given to her to swallow before her flight were kept in a house in Farawa area of Kano.
When she led NDLEA officers to the house, 52 wraps of the illicit substance with a total weight of 767 grammes were recovered.
Meanwhile, NDLEA operatives supported by officers and men of the Nigerian Army, Civil Defence Corps and Amotekun personnel on Tuesday, October 3, stormed James town in Ogunmakin, Obafemi Owode Local Government Area of Ogun State where they located and destroyed 10.38 tonnes of cannabis sativa covering over 4.152 hectares.
On their way back from the operation, the team also intercepted a truck marked FS548XN carrying a 40 feet container loaded with logs of wood.
A search of the container led to the recovery of two bags of cannabis sativa weighing 20kg while six suspects — Ahmed Yusuf, Olaniyi Babatunde, Adedeji Babatunde, Richard John, Osuolale Olamilekan and Abdulazeez Saheed — who were in the truck were arrested.
On Sunday, October 1, according to the spokesman, NDLEA operatives raided Obi camp in Owan West Local Government Area, Edo State, from where 30 sacks of skunk weighing 300kg and concealed in charcoal in a dilapidated mud house were evacuated.
Similarly, two cannabis farms measuring 1.179065 hectares at Igbanke forest in Orhiomwon Local Government Area of the state were identified and destroyed on Friday, October 6, while four suspects —Tersoo Zaria, 28; Ifeanyi Osai, 53; Moses David, 19 and Daniel Gabriel, 20 — were arrested.
In Gombe State, a suspect, Auwal Bindow, was arrested on Friday, October 6, along Bauchi-Gombe road with 50,000 capsules of Tramadol.
In Oyo State also, NDLEA operatives on patrol along Lagos-Ibadan expressway apprehended Anuoluwapo Blessing Iyanu, aged 32, with 52 blocks of compressed pawpaw shaped cannabis sativa weighing 30kg on Wednesday, October 4.
With the same vigour, various commands of the Agency across the country continued with the War Against Drug Abuse (WADA) advocacy campaigns in the past week.
Some of them include WADA sensitisation lecture for students and teachers of Igbonnibi High School, Ila Orangun, Osun State; WADA sensitisation lecture at Royal Ambassador Secondary School, Makurdi, Benue State; WADA sensitization lecture at Ilora Baptist Grammar School, Ilora, Oyo State and LGA WADA sensitisation lecture for students of Beth-Root Model Secondary School, Onitsha, Anambra State.
Commending the officers and men of the NAIA, MAKIA, Ogun, Oyo, Edo, and Gombe Commands of the Agency for their outstanding feats in the past week, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of NDLEA, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Retd) equally applauded their counterparts in all the commands across the country for intensifying their WADA advocacy lectures thus creating a fair balance between their drug supply reduction and drug demand reduction activities.
