The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency has announced the arrest of one 80-year-old grandfather, Pa Aremu Shojobi, with illegal products worth about 14 kilograms of cannabis.
The arrest was made known by the spokesperson of the agency, Femi Babafemi in a statement made public on Sunday. He noted that the suspect was arrested, and he confessed that he has been in the illegal business for the past 25 years while disclosing that that he has always got his products from Benin Republic.
The statement confirmed that the operatives of the Lagos State Strategic Command of the Agency had arrested the suspect on Friday for 14 kilograms of cannabis at his home in the Iyana Ipaja area of the state. The suspect, according to the statement, has always got his products from other African countries and sells them to customers in his house from 7 am to 10 pm every day.
The spokesperson also noted that the suspect was arrested with 25,000,000.00 pills of tapentadol, an opioid three times stronger than tramadol, and 350,000 bottles of codeine-based syrup, which were among the products that were recovered from the Tin Can port complex in Lagos. The NDLEA, according to the statement, noted that products were recovered on September 17 and 20, 2024, after the containers were placed on a watch list after an intelligence report from the team.
He disclosed the NDLEA after the report requested that the containers be searched at the rate of 100% with the men of the Nigeria Customs Service and other security agencies. The statesmen noted that the estimated value of the illicit drugs stands at N13,725,000,000.00, while the codeine products have an estimated street value of N2,450,000,000.00, bringing the total value of the seizures to N16,175,000,000.00.
He further noted that the tapentadol consignment packed in 500 cartons was among the products seen in a container arrested on Tuesday, September 17. In another operation, some of the NDLEA noted that its men were able to discover a container containing 175,000 bottles of Barcadin cough syrup with codeine packed in 875 cartons. The third container contained 75,000 bottles of CSC cough syrup with codeine, which was part of the discovery for Friday, September 20.
In another operation, the NDLEA noted that the men of the agency in Lagos on September 18 raided the two homes of a community leader and Sarkin Yamma of Badagry West LCDA, Alhaji Bashir Mohammed Talba; in the operation, the men recovered 226kg of cannabis from his two wives and son.
It was added that the main suspect, Alhaji Talba, had taken to hills but the men of the agency, after a search of the house of the suspect in the Ashipa area of Seme Badagry, led to the discovery and recovery of 93 compressed blocks of cannabis sativa weighing 57.6kg from his first wife Asma’u Bashiru, 35, and son, Sadat Bashiru, 22. Another search of his home in the Aketegbo area of Seme Badagry led to the seizure of 302 compressed blocks of cannabis weighing 168.6kg from his second wife, Hauwa Bashir, 42.
The operatives also recovered 720 blocks of Arizona, a strain of cannabis weighing 390kg, from a Mitsubishi delivery van marked MUS 720 XH at the Ojo area of Lagos on Monday, September 16
In Kano state, at the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, the spokesperson noted that the operative of the agency on September 15 arrested a 38-year-old drug mule, Okafor Ifeanyi Anthony. He was reportedly attempting to leave the country through a Qatar Airlines flight to Iran via Doha with 76 wraps of cocaine in his stomach.
The suspect, according to the statement, after three days of excretion observation, excreted 76 pellets of the ingested cocaine weighing 1.267kg.
The operative attached to Kogi state on patrol along the Okene-Lokoja-Abuja Expressway on Tuesday, September 17, recovered 700,000 pills of excel-5 coming from Lagos for distribution in Kano and Kaduna states. The suspects, according to the agency Udemefuna Chibuike, 23, have been apprehended by officers of the command. He was arrested on September 20, along the Mokwa-Jebba Road, Niger State, in possession of 49,000 tablets of tramadol, 20,000 tablets of diazepam, 100 ampoules of tramadol injection and 50 bottles of cough syrup with codeine.
In Rivers State capital, Porth Harcourt, it was confirmed that the men had arrested some men of the command with 451 blocks of cannabis weighing 213kg; the suspects were arrested by the officers at the Azikiwe Road, Port Harcourt, Rivers State on Wednesday, September 18, a suspect named Ogochukwu Paul, 33, was arrested with the illegal products, he was reportedly taking the products to a notorious drug haven in Borikiri.
In the north-central, the operatives of the Plateau State on Friday, September 20, arrested a wanted suspect, Jonathan Ali Abuttur, 46, at the Agingi-Rukuba Road, Bassa LGA; he was found with 808kg of cannabis sativa concealed in 68 bags of sugar and fertiliser, the officer also arrested a suspect in Kwara State named Shaibu Musa with 28kg of the psychoactive substance.
