NIGERIAN authorities have seized 19.4 kg of cocaine valued at 4.66 billion naira ($2.93 million) from a passenger arriving at Lagos’ Murtala Muhammed International Airport on a flight from Ethiopia. The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) announced the arrest of a 48-year-old Nigerian businessman on September 18, describing him as a repeat offender.
The suspect, who had previously been convicted of drug trafficking in 2022, managed to avoid jail time by paying a fine. This time, however, he was found carrying 817 wraps of cocaine in his luggage.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation with over 200 million residents, has increasingly become not just a transit hub for international drug cartels but also a significant consumer and distributor of narcotics.
‘The agency will continue to work to disrupt the activities of drug cartels operating in the country,’ NDLEA chief Mohammed Buba Marwa said in a statement.
The NDLEA has ramped up efforts to combat the growing drug problem in Nigeria, intercepting multiple shipments of narcotics and arresting offenders at the nation’s airports. This latest seizure marks another major success in its fight against illicit drug networks operating within and beyond Nigeria’s borders.
