10 Filipino Sailors, Ship Convicted, Fined $6m For Cocaine Trafficking

Ten Filipino sailors and their merchant vessel, marked MV Nord Bosporus, have been convicted and fined a total of $6 million, as well as another penalty of N1.1 million by a Federal High Court in Lagos.

This came barely four months after their arrest by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) for importing 20 kilogrammes of cocaine from Santos, Brazil into Nigeria through the Apapa seaport in Lagos.

The merchant vessel and its crew members were arrested following the seizure of 20 kilogrammes of cocaine on board the ship by NDLEA officers at the Apapa seaport in Lagos on November 16, 2025.

A four-count criminal charge was subsequently filed against them in suit number FHC/L/1232C/25 at the Federal High Court 2 in Lagos by a team of NDLEA prosecutors led by the agency’s director of Prosecution and Legal Services, Theresa Asuquo.

The vessel and its Filipino sailors, namely: Eugene Quinos Corpuz, Mark Joseph Jardiniano, Alexis Navidad Evarrola, Francis Gerard Niones Carpio, Franz Jude Mayran, Mahinay Junniel Lagura, Mario Ganiban Malvar, Hormachuelos Lordito Guivencan, Joshua Emmanuel Hufanda and Edwin Baltazar Reyes, however, decided to plead guilty and enter a plea bargain agreement.

The spokesperson of the NDLEA, Femi Babafemi, while delivering his ruling on the plea bargain agreement yesterday, the trial judge, Justice Ayokunle Faji, of the Federal High Court 2, Lagos, found MV Nord Bosporus guilty of an offence under Section 25 of the NDLEA Act.

The judge ordered the vessel to pay a penalty of N100,000 for the offence and to pay restitution in the sum of five million, three hundred and fifty thousand US dollars to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The three principal officers of the vessel who are the 2nd, 3rd and 4th defendants in the case were also convicted and sentenced to pay the sum of N100,000 each and a restitution of $100,000 each to the Federal Republic of Nigeria, while the 5th to 11th defendants were equally convicted and sentenced to pay N100,000 each in addition to a restitution of $50,000 each.

This brings the total fines payable to the federal government by the vessel and its 10 sailors to $6 million and N1.1 million, respectively.

Reacting to the landmark judgement, the chairman/chief executive officer of NDLEA, Brig-Gen. Mohamed Marwa (rtd), noted that the conviction of the vessel and its crew members “is a resounding victory for the rule of law and a powerful testament to the renewed vigour of the NDLEA in our mission to rid Nigeria of illicit drugs.”

He added that “the imposition of a $6 million fine equally serves as a stark, expensive lesson to international drug cartels and their local collaborators that Nigeria’s territorial waters are no longer a playground for the illicit narcotics trade.”