Drug lord nabbed with 93 cocaine wraps in Lagos hotel

NDLEA  recovers 12.4 million pills of opioids, 6,921.5kg skunk
Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), on Friday, July 21, stormed a hotel in Okota area of Lagos and arrested a drug kingpin, when he was preparing a recruited courier to swallow 93 pellets of cocaine meant for distribution in Italy.

The 48-year-old Charles Uwagbale had recruited Uju Dominic, 35, from his base in Italy with a deal to come to Nigeria, ingest 100 pellets of cocaine on Friday, July 21, and return to Italy on Saturday, July 22.

Spokesperson for the Agency, Femi Babafemi, in a statement, yesterday, said due to plan, upon the arrival in Nigeria, the mule was lodged in Golden Heaven Hotel,  located at Enoma street off Ago-Palace way, Okota, Isolo, Lagos, where Uwagbale brought 93 wraps of the Class A drug for him to swallow at about 23:45p.m. Friday night.

According to him, the notorious drug kingpin specialises in sponsoring young Nigerians to traffick Class A drugs to Europe, especially Italy.

It was, however, a rude shock to the kingpin when NDLEA operatives, who have been on their trail following credible intelligence, stormed their hotel room, arrested both and recovered the drug exhibits with a total weight of 1.427 kilogrammes.

“Operatives of the Lagos Stare Command of the Agency, who made the arrest and seizure had on Thursday, July, 20 raided Akala in Mushin area of the state, where they recovered 37.5kg of cannabis from the home of a fleeing suspect,” he added.

“Meanwhile, attempts to smuggle 98 cartons containing 5,122,900 pills of Tramadol 225mg with an estimated street value of about N3.7 billion into Nigeria through the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Ikeja, Lagos, have been thwarted through the robust synergy between men of the Nigeria Customs Service and NDLEA officers at the airport, as well as those at the DHL cargo warehouse.

“Preliminary findings revealed that the consignments were imported from India and Pakistan, while some of the seized consignments had Freetown, Sierra Leone as final destination.

“Similarly, NDLEA operatives in Bauchi State have recovered a total of 6,265,080 pills of opioids from three suspects: Emmanuel Onyebuchi, 32; Uche Iyida, 33; and Chinedu Ezeanyim, 32, following their arrest alongside a truck driver and his assistant at Shopping Complex, Maiduguri Bye-Pass, Bauchi town on Wednesday, July 19, and the subsequent follow up search of the residence of Iyida on Friday, July 21.

“No fewer than 999,500 tablets of Exol-5 were also recovered by operatives from a shop close to the market at Hong Road, Gombi, Adamawa State on Friday, July 21, while 46,000 capsules of tramadol were seized from a suspect, Paul Ajaegbu, 36, along Owerri – Aba road, Imo State on Monday, July 27.

“Same suspect had earlier been arrested, precisely on February 9, for the same offence.

“In Ondo State, NDLEA operatives in their numbers stormed the Ofosu forest where they destroyed 29 hectares of Cannabis farms on Thursday, July 20.

The quartet of Osamezu George Chukwuemeka, 51, who owns the farm; his wife Kate Osamezu, 43; Agboola Wasiu, 37 and Mustapha Sanni, were arrested during the operation, while 118.5 kg of processed Cannabis was recovered from the farm. In another raid of the warehouse of a suspect at Elegbeka, Ose LGA, not less than 107 jumbo bags of the same illicit substance weighing 1,132.5 kg were recovered on Monday, July 17.  While operatives in Sokoto state arrested a suspect, Charles Nwankwo, 50, with 610 kg of Cannabis in Tamaje area of Sokoto on Friday, July 21, their counterparts in Yobe, also same day, nabbed a fleeing suspect, Shaibu Musa, 29, in Dawasa while he was offering them a bribe of N500,000 following the seizure of 36kg skunk in his house on Wednesday, July 19.

Impressed by the volume of arrests and seizures made by officers and men of MMIA, Lagos, Bauchi, Adamawa, Ondo, Sokoto, Yobe, Edo, Imo, Kano, Kogi, Ogun, Nasarawa and Tincan Commands in the past week, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of NDLEA, Brig. Gen. Mohammed  Buba Marwa (Retd) commended them for job well done.

He urged them and their counterparts across the country to continue the synergy with other security agencies and stakeholders in the fight against substance abuse and illicit drug trafficking.