Some suspected drug traffickers who thought they could hide under the cover of huge volume of air passenger traffic witnessed at Murtala Muhammed International Airport Lagos, during yuletide period, to carry out illicit drug activities, have been arrested by the operatives of the Lagos Airport Command of National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA)
The interception, according to investigations by African Business Travel News,(ABTN) led to the arrest of about nine suspects including a South African national and seizures running to hundreds of kilogrammes of illicit narcotic substances, on various day between December 24 and 31, 2017.
Many of them were suspects were said to have originated their flight from Brazil and had connection to Lagos at Johannesburg before they were arrested during an inward screening of passengers on South Africa Airways flights..
A reliable source at the Lagos Airport told ABTN that the suspected who believed that they had perfected their ways by changing airline on which they were readily intercepted by NDLEA operatives, decided to use the South Africa airline from Brazil connecting Lagos through Johannesburg, were shocked to realize that they arrived into the waiting dragnets of the anti drug law enforcement agency in the Lagos airport.
“These NDLEA operatives are very proactive in their operations. They made a lot of arrests of suspected drug traffickers and seizures between December 24 till 31, 2017. While some of the suspects were arrested on the flights of other airlines, the majority of the arrests were made of South Africa Airways’ flights. We learnt that the NDLEA operatives have discovered that the suspects have changed their choice of airline from their Brazil base to Nigeria. But unfortunate for them they were arrested on arrival in Lagos. I can tell you that one of them is a South African who feigned an ailment believing that the agency would allow him to go back to his country because of his health condition, but he was wrong as NDLEA officials hold on to him, took him a well equipped hospital for treatment. It was however discovered at the hospital that suspect was seeking a cunning way to get off the NDLEA’s hook. Het has since been returned to his cell after treatment,” the source told our correspondent…
However, attempts to get the Commander, NDLEA Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Mr. Garba to comment on the arrests and seizures were not successful. He was said to have stepped out of office some minutes before our correspondent got to his office. Also another attempt to get the agency’s spokesperson Jonah Achema comment on the development proved abortive; his line was switched off when a call was put through to him by our correspondent.
