The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency has secured the conviction of 2,224 persons, comprising 1,985 males and 239 females, following the arrests of 8,561 drug traffickers between January and August 2023.
The anti-narcotics agency also seized a total of 888,743 illicit drugs within the same period, according to official data exclusively obtained by our correspondent.
The agency recently disclosed that approximately 14.3 million Nigerians within the age range of 15 and 64 years, with an increasing number of women were now involved in drug abuse.
The Ogun State Commander of the NDLEA, Ibiba Odili, stated this earlier in the month during the War Against Drug Abuse launch in collaboration with the Lions Club International in Abeokuta.
Odili said, “14.3 million Nigerian drug abusers are 15 to 64 years old, while one out of every four drug users is a woman. In 2018, data shows that more women are going into drug use.
“If more women are going into drug use, it is a source of worry for us as the traditional role of women in families and communities as caregivers, role models, and life moulders will be threatened, and what quality of children are these women going to raise?”
Saturday PUNCH reports that on May 16, 2023, operatives of the NDLEA confiscated a substantial shipment of methamphetamine at the export shed of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos.
The illicit substance was concealed in powdered custard containers, forming part of a combined cargo destined for London, United Kingdom.
Similarly, a trans-border trafficker, Faisal Mohammed, 27, was on Wednesday, May 17, arrested in Mubi following the interception of a truck from Onitsha, Anambra State, where a total of 2,376 sachets of tramadol comprising 23,760 pills were found concealed in three blue rubber jerry cans which were hidden underneath the body part of the trailer.
In June, agents of the NDLEA arrested two Qatar-based drug kingpins, Eyah Nnamdi, aka Murphy, and Oluchukwu Ugwuoke, following the interception of their methamphetamine consignment at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos.
Similarly, the agency arrested a female pharmacist, Ikwebe Helen, in Kaduna State following her attempt to use forged documents to purchase and distribute six cartons of pentazocine injection with 2,000 ampules.
Operatives of the NDLEA in July intercepted over 64 863.5kg of nitrous oxide, otherwise known as ‘laughing gas’, at the Apapa seaport in Lagos and in Imo State.
In August, operatives of the NDLEA arrested a fake couple and other drug dealers in some parts of the country.
The couple, Ilonzeh Onyebuchi and Ilonzeh Nonyelum, who were purportedly going for medical treatment in India, ingested 184 wraps of cocaine weighing 3.322 kilogrammes with another 100 grammes of the drug also concealed in the woman’s genitals.
Meanwhile, on Monday, October 2, the NDLEA announced its plan to develop strategies to take drug cartels out of business and protect the environment from the damaging effects of illicit drug cultivation and production.
The chairman of the agency, Brigadier General Buba Marwa (retd.), stated this while outlining efforts by the Nigerian government to curb the menace of substance abuse and illicit drug production and trafficking during his presentation at the third committee session of the 8th United Nations General Assembly, in New York, USA.
He noted that Nigeria was adopting a whole-of-society approach to countering the challenges of drug trafficking in line with the 2030 SDGs agenda, which sought to promote the rule of law, health, peace, and justice.
