Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) have uncovered and dismantled a drug trafficking syndicate using Hajj pilgrims as couriers to smuggle cocaine into Saudi Arabia. The agency announced the arrest of three alleged kingpins behind the operation in Kano State.
The crackdown followed the arrest of two pilgrims, Ibrahim Umar Mustapha and Muhammad Siraj Shifado, on Monday, May 26, at the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport. The suspects, who were attempting to board Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET 940 to Jeddah, were intercepted at the NDLEA’s final screening point based on actionable intelligence.
Subsequent body scans confirmed that the duo had ingested illicit substances. They were placed under excretion observation and later expelled 45 wraps of cocaine each, totaling 90 pellets and weighing 1.04 kilograms.
Further investigation led to the arrest of the alleged sponsors of the operation—Abubakar Muhammad, Abdulhakeem Muhammed Tijjani, and Muhammad Aji Shugaba—on Tuesday 27th and Wednesday 28th May in Kano.
In a related development, NDLEA officers also arrested a 60-year-old businessman, Chinedu Leonard Okigbo, on May 28 during outward clearance for a Qatar Airways flight to Iran. A body scan revealed he had ingested drugs. He subsequently excreted 65 wraps of cocaine weighing 1.41 kilograms.
Meanwhile, in Rivers State, NDLEA operatives, in collaboration with Customs and other security agencies, intercepted seven containers between May 28 and 30 at the Onne Port, Port Harcourt. The containers were found to contain 825,200 bottles of codeine-based syrup and trodol, with a street value of ₦5.78 billion, and 5.1 million pills of tapentadol 225mg valued at ₦3.57 billion. The total street value of the seized opioids amounts to ₦9.35 billion.
In another operation in Kano on Friday, May 30, operatives arrested two suspects—Abubakar Hussein (42) and Sahabi Adamu (53)—on the Kano-Maiduguri highway with $900,000 in cash suspected to be counterfeit. The suspects and the exhibit are to be handed over to relevant authorities for further investigation.
Elsewhere, NDLEA officers recovered 390 compressed blocks of skunk cannabis weighing 275.3kg from an abandoned Toyota Sienna vehicle along the Ngurore-Yola road in Adamawa State on May 27.
In Ilorin, Kwara State, a notorious female drug dealer, Alhaja Mutiat Abdul-Fatai, was apprehended on May 31 at the Oja Oba area. Seized from her were various quantities of tramadol, flunitrazepam, and codeine-based syrup.
Beyond enforcement, the NDLEA intensified its War Against Drug Abuse (WADA) campaign with sensitization lectures delivered in secondary schools across Katsina, Enugu, Anambra, Kano, and Cross River States.
Commending the efforts of the operatives, NDLEA Chairman/Chief Executive, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Rtd), praised the MAKIA, PHPC, Kano, Kwara, and Adamawa Commands for their recent successes. He also lauded officers nationwide for maintaining a balanced approach to both drug supply and demand reduction strategies.
