The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested a 62-year-old China-bound businessman, Nwabueze Nicholas Izueke, at the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport (MAKIA), heading to China with 95 jumbo-sized wraps of cocaine weighing 1.589 kilograms buried in his stomach.
Confirming his arrest, NDLEA spokesperson, Femi Babafemi, said Nwabueze was arrested on January 31st at the Kano airport during the outward clearance of passengers going to China via Addis Ababa on Ethiopian Airlines flight ET940.
When taken for body scan, he tested positive for ingesting illicit drug and was promptly placed under excretion observation.
“While under observation, the suspect who claims he’s into clothing and auto spare parts business in Lagos, expelled a total of 95 pellets of the class A drug in seven excretions.
“In his statement, he claimed he decided to engage in illicit drug trafficking to raise enough money to complete the country home he’s building in his village, Iwollo, Enugu state,” Babafemi said.
In a related development, a total of 627.7 kilograms of skunk, a strain of cannabis, were recovered from a makeshift warehouse within Fums Plaza in Kubwa, FCT, attempt by Ebube Okeke, Evans Ugwu, Mohammed Eze Arinze and Friday Michael to smuggle consignments of methamphetamine concealed in Mp3 speakers from Enugu to Abuja and Kaduna was on Friday 6th February foiled by NDLEA operatives in Abuja who intercepted the consignments in a bus.
Babafemi said a follow up operation in Zuba, FCT led to the arrest of Ebube Okeke who is the owner of one of the parcels containing 173grams of meth, while the trio of Evans Ugwu, Mohammed Eze Arinze and Friday Michael were nabbed on Saturday 7th February in Kaduna when they showed up to collect the second consignment weighing 28grams of meth.
