The suspect was arrested at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos on Sunday, January 21, 2024, during the inward clearance of passengers on an Ethiopian Airlines flight from Sao Paulo, Brazil via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
A Nigerian returnee from Brazil identified as Udechukwu Ekene Theophilus has been arrested by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) for ingesting 60 wraps of cocaine.
The suspect was arrested at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos on Sunday, January 21, 2024, during the inward clearance of passengers on an Ethiopian Airlines flight from Sao Paulo, Brazil via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Femi Babafemi, NDLEA Director of Media and Advocacy made this known in a statement on Sunday. He noted that Ekene had initially refused to undergo a body scan, raising health concerns in a desperate bid to evade arrest.
Babafemi said, "When he was however offered other options, he accepted to be placed on excretion observation and shortly after he was ushered into NDLEA observatory, he excreted the first set of cocaine pellets, after which he expelled a total of 60 wraps of the class A drug weighing 1.279 kilograms in five excretions.
"In his statement, Udechukwu claimed he ingested the consignment in Brazil and was to discharge everything at the airport in Addis Ababa but could only excrete 15 pellets which he handed over to another member of his syndicate before his connecting flight to Nigeria was called.
"In the same vein, NDLEA operatives at the Lagos airport on Tuesday 23rd January recovered a total of twelve (12) cartons of tramadol 225mg containing five hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred (599,900) pills weighing 385.40kg from an overstayed cargo at the SAHCO import shed of the Lagos airport after a joint examination with other agencies.
"The tramadol consignment had come into the country in two batches on KLM Royal Dutch Airline flights from Karachi, Pakistan between 27th July and 1st August 2023. They were however placed under watch by NDLEA operatives since then.
"Not less than 822 kilograms of cannabis sativa hidden in a fuel station located at Ashipa community along Badagry-Seme Road were recovered by operatives of the Seme Special Area Command of NDLEA, while a suspect Sani Audu, 35, was arrested with 111.3kg of same substance at Maigatari town in Jigawa State on Tuesday 23rd January.”
"In Yobe state, two suspects: Mohammed Usman and Adamu Ma'azu were arrested on Saturday 27th January with 49 blocks of cannabis sativa weighing 50kg at Damaturu motor park, Damaturu, while the duo of Paul Obor, 38, and Dennis Fuokorighe, 48, who were arrested on Wednesday 24th January at a Navy checkpoint, Itobe, Ofu LGA, Kogi state with 318 compressed blocks of cannabis sativa weighing 190.8kg concealed in a gold colour Honda Accord Car marked RBC 449AE, were handed over to the Kogi state command of the Agency on Friday 26th Jan. by men of the Nigeria Navy Ship, Lugard, Lokoja," the statement added.