NDLEA Nabs Chinese Businessman, 80yrs Old Grandma, Seizes Colorado Stuffed In Moimoi Sachets
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested a Chinese businessman, Liang Tak You, and an 80-year-old grandmother, Mrs. Grace Ekpeme, during a nationwide operation that uncovered consignments of Colorado— a synthetic cannabis strain—stuffed in moimoi sachets, and Canadian Loud concealed in imported canned food items.
A statement by the Director, Media and Advocacy, NDLEA, Femi Babafemi, in Abuja, on Sunday, noted that Liang was arrested at the arrival hall of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos, on Friday, following actionable intelligence.
“The suspect, who arrived in Nigeria from Bangkok via Dubai on an Emirates Airlines flight, is a Chinese national, naturalised and based in Malaysia. “He reportedly travelled to Thailand to pick up two suitcases containing 50 parcels of Loud, weighing 26.10kg, before flying to Nigeria”, Babafemi stated.
He explained that NDLEA operatives, who had been tracking Tak You from his port of departure, allowed him to pass through immigration and other airport protocols before arresting him on his way out of the airport.
“In a separate incident, the octogenarian, Mrs. Grace Ekpeme, was arrested in the early hours of Saturday, July 26, at Edet-Nsa Street, Base Site, Calabar South, Cross River State, with over 3kg of skunk, following intelligence reports on her drug trafficking activities. Also in Lagos, NDLEA operatives on Wednesday, July 23, intercepted a suspect, Chidi Agbafo, along the Epe–Ajah Expressway while transporting consignments of 21.7kg of Colorado—some of which were packaged in moimoi cooking sachets—and 3.8 litres of codeine-based syrup in a commercial bus en route to Warri and Oghara in Delta State.
“At the Apapa seaport in Lagos, a joint examination by NDLEA officers, Customs personnel, and other security agencies on Friday, July 25, uncovered 101kg of Canadian Loud. The drugs were factory-packed in 202 tins of imported food items labelled ‘Bean Salad Mix’ and concealed in two Toyota Sienna buses inside a container that originated from Canada”, the statement added.
Meanwhile, on the Abuja-Kaduna highway, NDLEA operatives on patrol on Wednesday, July 23, “arrested one Usman Musa with 71,000 pills of opioids—including tramadol, diazepam, and Exol-5—while travelling in a commercial bus headed to Kano.”
He added, “In Borno State, a 30-year-old woman, Binta Usman, was arrested on the same day at her residence in the Muna Moforo area of Maiduguri, where 30.1kg of skunk was recovered. A follow-up operation on Friday, July 25, led to the arrest of her accomplice, Bala Abdullahi, in the same area. Three brothers—Nanna, Chizom, and Maxwell Ozirinye—were arrested on Saturday, July 26, when NDLEA operatives raided a cannabis plantation at Bending Corner Forest, Idoani, Ose Local Government Area of Ondo State. There, they destroyed 2,500kg of skunk cultivated on a hectare of land and recovered 121.4kg of already processed cannabis”.
