Hotel staff and businessmen are detained in Abuja, Lagos, for drug trafficking

Agbo Tochukwu, who allegedly attempted to board a flight to Oman with a batch of 58 sachets of skunk weighing 29.10 kg, was also apprehended by NDLEA agents.

Thank God Emenike and Chidike Prince, two businessmen from Lagos, were detained for allegedly smuggling heroin and cocaine into their tummies while travelling to Hong Kong and France.

On Friday, October 20, and Saturday, October 21, the suspects were taken into custody by agents of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja, the capital city.

Agbo Tochukwu, who allegedly attempted to board a flight to Oman with a batch of 58 sachets of skunk weighing 29.10 kg, was also apprehended by NDLEA agents.

This was revealed in a statement released on Sunday by NDLEA Spokesman Femi Babafemi, who said that Tochukwu was captured at Lagos’s Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Ikeja.

“Two businessmen were apprehended by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport (NAIA) in Abuja. The men had packages of cocaine and heroin bound for Hong Kong and France hidden in their stomachs.”

“On Friday, October 20, during the outbound passenger clearance of Air France flight 818 to Paris, ThankGod Chimamkpa Emenike, 38, was arrested at the boarding gate of the Abuja airport. On Saturday, October 21, Agbo Chidike Prince, 41, was taken into NDLEA custody while attempting to board an Ethiopian Airlines flight ET 950 to Hong Kong via Addis Ababa.

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After a body scan proved they had used illegal narcotics, they were both taken into custody and arrested. Following several days in detention and multiple excretions, Chidike released 49 cocaine pellets totaling 998.53 grammes, while Emenike released 72 wraps of heroin weighing 1.171 kilogrammes. Chidike stated in his statement that he is a businessman at the Alaba International Market in the Ojo neighbourhood of Lagos who deals in spare parts. The N3.5 million he was to get, he continued, would be used to import products from Hong Kong.

Babafemi further mentioned that Tochukwu revealed that prior to going into drug trafficking, he was employed as a hotel attendant in Oman.

According to Babafemi, the agency seized 2,197 kg of illegal substances in Ondo and 541 kg in Oyo and Lagos during various operations around the nation.

“In the interim, four interdiction operations in various parts of Ondo state recovered a total of 2,197 kilogrammes of skunk within four days,” he said. On Tuesday, October 24, 691 kilogrammes of the cargo were found in Ukugu forest in Ipele, while 1,165.5 kg were found in Uso, Owo LGA on Wednesday, October 25. On Monday, October 23, at Agula Road, Ogbese, Akure North LGA, a 32-year-old suspect, Ifeanyi Abuguja, was taken into custody with 87 kg of the same material. On Thursday, October 26, 253.5 kg of the substance were found at Ogbese market in Akure North LGA.

In Oyo state, on Sunday, October 22, two suspects, Ayo Dele, 19, and Olaitan Ahmed, 23, were taken into custody in a drug den in the Nalende neighbourhood of Ibadan city with 160 grammes of cannabis. A follow-up operation at their warehouse in the same neighbourhood resulted in the discovery of 332 kg of the same substance.

“On Monday, October 23, agents from the Lagos Command of the Agency found and seized a car carrying 209 kg of liquor in the Okun Ajah region of the state. On Saturday, October 28, agents from Gombe found and seized 401 kg of sativa cannabis blocks and 21,000 tramadol capsules in the Tumfure region of the state.”