IT was a rude shock to a notorious drug kingpin who specializes in sponsoring young Nigerians to traffick Class A drugs to Europe especially Italy, when operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), stormed his hotel room in Okota area of Lagos late on Friday 21st July when he was preparing a recruited courier to swallow 93 pellets of cocaine meant for distribution in Italy.
The 48-year-old drug kingpin, Charles Uwagbale, had recruited Uju Dominic, 35, from his base in Italy with a deal to come to Nigeria, ingest 100 pellets of cocaine on Friday 21st July and return to Italy on Saturday 22nd July.
True to plan, upon arrival in Nigeria, the mule was lodged in Golden Heaven Hotel located at Enoma street off Ago-Palace way, Okota, Isolo, Lagos where Uwagbale brought 93 wraps of the Class A drug for him to swallow at about 23:45pm Friday night.
NDLEA’s Director, Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, disclosed in a statement on Sunday that the drug lord and his mule were in the process when operatives who have been on their trail following credible intelligence stormed their hotel room, arrested both and recovered the drug exhibits with a total weight of 1.427 kilograms.
Operatives of the Lagos state Command of the Agency who made the arrest and seizure had on Thursday 20th July raided Akala in Mushin area of the state where they recovered 37.5kg cannabis from the home of a fleeing suspect.
Meanwhile, attempts to smuggle 98 cartons containing Five Million One Hundred and Twenty Two Thousand Nine Hundred (5, 122, 900) pills of Tramadol 225mg with an estimated street value of about Three Billion Seven Hundred Million Naira (N3.7billion) only into Nigeria through the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, MMIA, Ikeja, have been thwarted through the robust synergy between men of the Nigeria Customs Service and NDLEA officers at the airport as well as those at the DHL cargo warehouse.
Preliminary findings revealed that the consignments were imported from India and Pakistan, while some of the seized consignments had Freetown, Sierra Leone as final destination.
In the same vein, NDLEA operatives in Bauchi state have recovered a total of Six Million Two Hundred and Sixty-Five and Eighty (6,265,080) pills of opioids from three suspects: Emmanuel Onyebuchi, 32; Uche Iyida, 33; and Chinedu Ezeanyim, 32 following their arrest alongside a truck driver and his assistant at Shopping Complex, Maiduguri Bye-Pass, Bauchi town on Wednesday 19th July and the subsequent follow up search of the residence of Iyida on Friday 21st July.
In another development, no fewer than Nine Hundred and Ninety-Nine Five Hundred (999,500) tablets of Exol-5 were also recovered by operatives from a shop close to the market at Hong Road, Gombi, Adamawa state on Friday 21st July, while 46,000 capsules of tramadol were seized from a suspect, Paul Ajaegbu, 36, along Owerri – Aba road, Imo state on Monday 17th July. Same suspect had earlier been arrested, precisely on 9th February 2023, for the same offence.
In Ondo state, NDLEA operatives in their numbers stormed the Ofosu forest where they destroyed 29 hectares of cannabis farms on Thursday 20th July.
