NDLEA Intercepts Vietnam-bound Businessman With Cocaine

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), has intercepted a 40-year-old businessman, Ejike Chibuke Solomon with 1.45 kilograms of cocaine concealed in his luggage.

Solomon was intercepted while attempting to board an Ethiopia Airlines flight number 950 to Vietnam via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, NAIA, Abuja.

NDLEA spokesperson, Femi Babafemi said the suspect was apprehended at the Abuja airport on Saturday 2nd March 2024 after officers of the anti-narcotic agency subjected him to a thorough search.

In the process, the illicit substance was discovered to have been concealed, factory fitted, in his bag.

“In his statement, the suspect claimed he was on a business trip to Vietnam,” the NDLEA stated.

Meanwhile, operatives of the special unit of the agency on Friday 1st March, raided members of a syndicate that deal in methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin in their hideouts in parts of Lagos.

The NDLEA said, “the operatives assigned for the operation raided the home of Esimone Amachukwu Christopher at 14 Arochukwu street, Ejigbo, where 10.012 kilograms of methamphetamine was found in possession of his associate, 40-year-old Evelyn Nneka Okem.

The NDLEA spokesman said Esimone is currently at large.

“While the Ejigbo operation was going on, another set of officers were simultaneously busy in the residence of another member of the syndicate, 45-year-old Ebele Edwin Iwuegbunam, located at Plot 1604 Close D, 44th Avenue, Festac Town, Lagos.”

The NDLEA operatives subsequently arrested Iwuegbunam and recovered 429.5grams of cocaine and seven kilograms of heroin from the suspects.

In Kogi State, NDLEA officers on a “Stop and Search” operation along Okene-Lokoja-Abuja expressway on Friday, 1st March, intercepted a commercial bus marked GRM 347XA (Borno).

The bus was conveying 28 compressed blocks of cannabis sativa weighing 11kg; 100 bottles of codeine-based cough syrup and 500 tablets of diazepam, all concealed in three plastic drums covered with cattle fats, heading to Jos in Plateau State.

While operatives in Ogun State on Thursday 29th February recovered 169kg consignment of cannabis abandoned in a truck at Sagamu tollgate, their counterparts in Lagos seized 25 cartons of tramadol containing 325,000 pills in Ikeja the previous day, Wednesday 28th Feb.

Same day, a 42-year-old suspect, Abdullahi Garba Khalil arrested with 2,745,000 capsules of pregabalin which were recovered from him at Singer Market in the Sabon Gari area of Kano were handed over to the Kano State command of NDLEA by the Department of State Security (DSS).