The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested three sexagenarians and a Nigerien man over the seizure of over 52.252kg of cocaine, methamphetamine, Indian hemp, as well as 32,590 pills of opioids in Lagos, Kwara, Plateau and Sokoto states.
One of the suspects, Onyebi Benjamin Chimaobi, who frequents Cameroun, Ethiopia and Uganda, who had been on NDLEA’s watch list was on Saturday, February 18, arrested in Victory Estate, Ojo area of Lagos, in connection with the seizure of 19.70kg of cocaine abandoned on an Ethiopian Airline flight that arrived Lagos airport on Thursday, February 9.
Spokesman of the agency, Femi Babafemi, on Sunday, operatives on Thursday, February 23, intercepted an intending passenger, Obazee Timothy Eguagie, on a Turkish Airline flight to Torino, Italy, at the Lagos airport with various quantities of opioids.
The following day, February 24, NDLEA operatives intercepted eight cartons of shoes coming from Los Angeles, United States of America at the same airport, noting that concealed in the shoes were 37 parcels of the Loud variant of Indian hemp and that a 63-year-old man, Balogun Akinlabi Abideen, hired as a freight agent to clear the illicit consignment was arrested.
Babafemei said two other sexagenarians were arrested in connection with drug trafficking: Butven Siman (62), who was nabbed with 5.5kg of hemp on February 17 at Timbol village in Langtang South LGA of Plateau State; and 65-year-old Musa Shuaib, who was arrested with a kilogramme of hemp on February 23, in Ilorin, Kwara State.
In Sokoto State, NDLEA operatives at the Illela land border on February 21, intercepted a Nigerien, Bashar Abdu, with 1.460kg of hemp wrapped round his private part, while in Kaduna, a suspect, Mohammed Garba (a.k.a Alfazazi), was arrested with 6,390 tablets of tramadol 225mg weighing 3.4kg.
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