•Intercepts opioids going to US, UK, New Zealand
A 90-year-old man, Yusuf Yarkadir, has been nabbed by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) for allegedly selling hard drugs to youths at Yarkadir village where he is an indigene, in Rimi Local Government Area of Katsina state.
Director, Media and Advocacy
NDLEA headquarters, Abuja, Femi Babafemi, who disclosed this in a statement on Friday, July 9, 2021, said that the nonagenarian, who was full of regrets while being interrogated, confessed that he had been selling cannabis sativa to the youths in his community for eight years due to their demand for the illegal substance.
“Though he failed to disclose his source of supply, he vowed that his arrest on Wednesday 7th July, 2021, would now make him to back out of the business, having tried in the past to stop the illicit trade without success,” Babafemi stated.
In the same vein, narcotic officers in Ondo State command of the NDLEA arrested two teenage siblings along with other suspects for dealing in assorted illicit drugs in the state capital.
The teenagers, identified as Sunday (16) and his sister, Amaka, aged 15 (surnames withheld), were arrested in Car Street area of Akure, the state capital, with 1.894 kilogrammes of Tramadol on Monday, July 5, while 23-year-old Kazeem Oluyede was nabbed in Eru Oba area of the capital city with 300 grammes of cannabis and three grammes of methamphetamine.
Babafemi also said that a lady, Maryam Musa, 35, was arrested in Igbara-Oke, Ifedore Local Government Area of the state with 5.5 kilogrammes of cannabis on the same day.
Again, in the state, following credible intelligence and surveillance, NDLEA operatives stormed Ogbese market in Akure North Local Government Area on July 7, where Messrs Jalamia Ochonogor and Austin Uzoka were arrested with 63 kilogrammes of cannabis.
In Bauchi State, the Media and Advocacy Director said that at least seven persons were arrested while 28.091 kilogrammes of assorted drugs such as Diazepam, Exol-5, Rophynol, Tramadol, Codeine, and cannabis were recovered from them.
“Those arrested in two separate raids by operatives of the Bauchi state command of the Agency include Sunday Obi, Abba Abdullahi, Samuel John, Chijioke Agu, Sani Musa, Alhaji Alhaji Baffa, and Abubakar Saidu,” he added.
Meanwhile, different quantities of illicit drugs going to the United States, the United Kingdom and New Zealand have been intercepted and seized by narcotic officers of the Directorate of Operations and General Investigations (DOGI), attached to some courier companies in Lagos.
In one of the courier firms, 400 grammes of Ketamine hidden in carton of hair attachments carton coming from Cameroon and heading to the US was seized.
Others included 30 grammes of Tramadol concealed in female headgear coming from Onitsha, Anambra State and going to the UK; 200 grammes of Ketamine from Cameroon going to the USA; and 400 grammes of Methamphetamine from Asaba, Delta State, being taken to New Zealand.
Commending the officers and men of Katsina, Ondo and Bauchi Commands, as well as DOGI, for their vigilance and commitment to the goal of ridding every community in Nigeria of the menace of drug abuse and trafficking, Chairman/Chief Executive of NDLEA, Brig. General Mohammed Buba Marwa charged them not to relent, but to continue to raise the bar in the ongoing offensive action against the scourge and the cartels behind them.
