Bisola David
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency’s agents once again foiled desperate drug cartel attempts to export large quantities of illegal drugs, particularly cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and ephedrine, to Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, and Europe through the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Ikeja, Lagos.
According to The Punch, they intercepted the shipments and detained those responsible, Iwuozor Chinedu, a Nigerian living in Athens, Greece, is at the top of the list of persons who have been detained thus far in connection with the seizures.
On Friday, February 3, NDLEA tarmac team members seized two bags during a secondary check exercise at the bottom of the aircraft, leading to his debarkation from an Ethiopian Airlines flight.
Femi Babafemi, the anti-drug agency spokesperson, disclosed this is in a statement on Sunday.
Babafemi reported that during the bags’ searches, which took place in front of Chinedu and other airport stakeholders, two large pellets wrapped in foil paper and a few peppercorns were found on each of one bag’s two sides. The pellets were employed to create fictitious walls along the bag’s sides.
The two packages each contained narcotics with a gross weight of 900 grams and 1.30 kilograms that tested positive for cocaine and heroin, respectively.
In the initial interview, Chinedu stated he arrived in Nigeria three months ago to do surgery because he felt uneasy performing it in Athens. He added that he was handed the bag to deliver in greece for N2million.
A pregnant woman named Mrs. Sylvester Onome was also detained by NDLEA agents at the NAHCO export shed of the airport on Monday, January 30, after 800 grams of skunk were found hidden in two little radio sets she had sent to Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
He pointed out that on the same day, agents also stopped a shipment headed for Congo Kinshasa that contained 111 bottles of body cream that were actually hiding 24.50 kg of ephedrine, an important chemical precursor and key component in the production of methamphetamine.
After the first detention of two freight brokers, the cargo was later traced to a merchant at the Alaba trade fair complex in Lagos’ Ojo neighborhood, Onyekachukwu Uduekwelu.
Another housewife, Mrs. Okpara Chizoba, was detained on Friday, January 27, at her property in the Ijesha neighborhood of Lagos at 37 Obashola Street after 300 grams of skunk were discovered concealed in a bag of crayfish that she had transported via a freight agent to Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
In a similar vein, on January 26th, agents at the SAHCO export shed near the airport stopped a shipment of brand-new clothing headed for Sierra Leone.
Following a comprehensive check of the shipment, 300 grams of skunk and 100 grams of ecstasy were discovered in addition to a parcel weighing 1 kilogram that tested positive for methamphetamine. Mfonabasi Joseph, a freight agent, had already been detained in relation to the seizure.
Babafemi added that a suspect located in Italy named Duru Josephat had more than 255,500 pills of tramadol and diazepam hidden inside two of the luggage he was carrying on an Ethiopian Airlines aircraft to Milan, Italy.
He admitted that he had purchased the pills in Onitsha, Anambra state, and was transporting them to Italy for resale.
Agents at the Tincan harbor have once more confiscated 75.75kg of the same drug, this time from Montreal, Canada, hidden in a container of four used vehicles with the number MSCU 5336680, only a month after they seized a shipment of 24.5kg of cannabis indica concealed in imported used cars.
Coincidentally, the consignment has also been traced to a suspect already in custody in connection with the earlier seizure, Steve Adigwe and his accomplice, Cedrick Maduweke who still on the run.
In Bauchi State, a suspect Clement Ekweozor was nabbed at Rafin Zurfi area, Bauchi town with 28,088 pills of tramadol and other opioids, while 12,000 capsules of the same drug were among others recovered from four suspects when their commercial bus marked UGH 978 KS was intercepted at Koka junction, Asaba, Delta state by NDLEA operatives on Wednesday, January 1.
A 40-year-old secondary school teacher, Sani Isah was arrested by operatives at a house in the Jekadefari area of Gombe on Thursday, January 2, for dealing in a new psychoactive substance, Akuskura.
He was caught with precisely 2,198 bottles of the drug hidden in six suitcases, despite saying he started the illegal enterprise in 2018.
In Ogun State, 190 kg of cannabis were retrieved from a dealer named Emmanuel Ibrahim in the Lafenwa neighborhood of Abeokuta as a result of reliable information, and three suspects named Mohd Alasan, Yusif Musa, and Musa Musa were detained in Maidile, Kano, with 2,400 bottles of syrup with a codeine base.
A second dealer, 55-year-old Bako Ibrahim, was also detained on February 4 in Kano’s Sharada neighborhood together with 420 blocks of marijuana weighing 282kg.
With 612kg of the material discovered from him in Akure, Ondo State, another dealer of the same substance, Akeem Azeez, 39, was apprehended.
Following a follow-up operation in Minna, Niger state, agents from the agency’s Kogi state command now have Michael Ikechukwu, 30, in their custody as a suspect in the seizure of his shipment containing 106,800 tramadol pills that were sent to him from Onitsha, Anambra state, along the Okene-Lokoja highway.
