By A 30-year-old businessman based in Italy, Joseph Cyril, has been arrested by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency after officers discovered he had swallowed 98 wraps of cocaine, weighing roughly 1.5 kilogrammes, in a bid to smuggle the drug out of the country through Enugu.
Cyril was picked up on August 2 at the departure hall of the Akanu Ibiam International Airport as passengers were being cleared for an Ethiopian Airlines flight departing Nigeria. The agency’s Director of Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, said in a statement that Cyril was placed under observation afterwards, during which the swallowed wraps passed out of his system.
Investigators traced his movements to July 13, when he flew in from Italy, before travelling to a hotel in Awka, Anambra State, to ingest the drugs ahead of his attempted trip through Enugu. In his account to the agency, Cyril said he had been running a business in Italy for years and took on the smuggling job for a fee of 3,500 Euros, money he hoped would fund his relocation to Germany, where his family lives.
The arrest was one of several drug seizures the NDLEA reported across the country during the period under review. In Lagos, officers at a courier firm intercepted 1.2kg of cocaine hidden inside 25 phone chargers headed for Saudi Arabia. In contrast, a separate shipment of 500 grammes of cocaine, concealed in the false bottom of a backpack and destined for Italy, was stopped at another logistics company on August 3. A day later, a 2.3kg consignment of “Loud,” a synthetic cannabis strain imported from the United States, was intercepted at a Lagos shipping firm.
Along the Akure-Ilesha Expressway, NDLEA officers on patrol stopped a truck hauling 1,633kg of skunk disguised inside bags of rice shafts, leading to the arrest of two suspects, Buba Jamilu, 40, and Sanusi Ibrahim, 30. Separately, a raid on the Ita Ogbolu forest yielded a further 147kg of skunk.
In Oyo State, a warehouse at Elebure village in Orire Local Government Area was raided on August 3 based on intelligence, netting 731.03kg of cannabis and the arrest of 57-year-old Felicia Thompson; her alleged accomplice, Thompson Vincent Nwaka, remains at large. In Edo State, NDLEA operatives working alongside soldiers recovered 65 jumbo bags of skunk, weighing 604.5kg, at Ewe Luleha in Owan West Local Government Area on August 5.
In Abia State, a suspected drug joint operator, Chibuike Charles, 31, was arrested during a raid in Osisioma Local Government Area on August 6, with seven kilogrammes of skunk recovered from him. In Lagos, a long-wanted dealer, Adome Claude Sikuru, was finally caught at the Fibre Market drug enclave in Badagry on August 8 after a three-month manhunt, with 88.5kg of skunk seized from him.
At the Tincan Port Complex in Lagos, a joint operation between the NDLEA, Nigeria Customs Service, and other agencies uncovered 73 cartons containing 442 packets of cannabis-infused cookies and gummies, weighing a combined 309.4kg, during the inspection of a 40-foot container on August 4. A suspect, Larry Nnaji, was arrested in connection with the find.
The NDLEA’s Chairman and Chief Executive, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (retd.), commended personnel across the agency’s units in Enugu, Ondo, Oyo, Edo, Abia, Seme, and Tincan for the string of operations, and urged officers nationwide to keep up what he described as the agency’s balanced approach to tackling drug trafficking. The agency also continued its anti-drug abuse awareness campaigns in schools, places of worship, workplaces, and communities during the period.
(Punch)
