Operatives of the Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency have arrested a serving law enforcement officer, Popoola Abayomi for selling assorted illicit drugs to students of a federal university and cultists in Ogun state.
The drug dealer, who works for the security agency’s Lagos state command, was apprehended on Wednesday, June 15th, 2021, following days of surveillance on his wife’s shop in Camp area, Abeokuta.
A statement from the agency on Sunday said at around 8 p.m., one of his salesmen, a motorcycle rider known as Ogah, was trailed to the location and arrested with six pinches of Colorado weighing 1.17grams before Popoola, who had been on the Agency’s watch list, was apprehended with various illicit drugs including codeine -17 bottles; cannabis -22.26grams; tramadol 230 -98grams; 61 tablets of flunitrazepam
tablets -23.72grams; 113 tablets of molly -48.16grams
Following the arrest of the two suspects, some student union officials from the institution used their official vehicle to block the NDLEA team. The narcotics agents, on the other hand, remained calm and eventually succeeded in taking the suspects into custody after an hours-long standoff.
In the same vein, on June 13th, one Adelodun Kamaldeen was apprehended by operatives of the Agency’s Oyo State Command at General Area, Ilorin, Kwara State following the interception of a parcel containing cocaine and heroin weighing 10.5grams and 4.8grams, respectively.
The statement added that the following day, two ladies; Mary Peter, 40, and Mercy Oladele, 39, were arrested at Total Garden, Ibadan when NDLEA operatives acting on a tip-off, intercepted their commercial micra car. The two women were arrested with seven bags of cannabis weighing 77.23kg brought in from Ogbese, Ondo State, to supply a man they simply identified as Alhaji. According to them, they had earlier supplied the same Alhaji two bags before coming with the seven bags they were caught with.
On Friday 18th June, operatives of the Oyo state Command acting on intelligence also raided the residence of one Alhaji Faruq at Elebu area, Akala expressway, Oluyole LGA, Ibadan, where they recovered 43 ampoules of methylphenidate.
In Kaduna state, a drug trafficker, Segun Abraham was arrested at Panteka area of the state on 17th June with 211.500kg of skunk heading to Kano state.
Meanwhile, a Nigerian returning from Pakistan, Ezenyeche Kingsley Ebuka has been arrested by NDLEA operatives at the Murtala Muhammed International Airpirt, MMIA, Ikeja Lagos with five pellets of heroin weighing 250grams discovered in his anus.
The suspect had arrived the ‘D’ arrival hall of the airport on 14th June on Turkish airline flight from Pakistan with the illicit drug inserted in his anus. He however failed to beat the eagle eyes of narcotic officers during inward clearance of passengers on the flight.
While commending the Agency’s Ogun, Oyo, Kaduna, and MMIA Commands for maintaining the offensive against illicit drug trafficking and the cartels that run it, Gen. Marwa warned that any law enforcement officer who uses the privilege of his uniform to engage in narcotic criminal business will be prosecuted.
“Those who think they can sabotage ongoing efforts to rid Nigeria of the menace of illicit drug trafficking and abuse hiding behind the façade of their uniforms should better think twice because they’ll have NDLEA to contend with. We’ll not only arrest and expose them but we’ll equally prosecute them and seize all assets acquired through the proceeds of their criminal act”, he warned.
