Wheelchair-bound drug dealer, ex- convict, others arrested by NDLEA

Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency have arrested a drug dealer, 45-year-old Godwin Emuneyin, who is physically challenged and uses his wheelchair as a cover to deal in illicit substances such as methamphetamine and cannabis in Afuze, the headquarters of Owan East Local Government Area of Edo State.

The anti-narcotics agency revealed that the suspect was arrested on Tuesday, November 7, at his base in Afuze following credible intelligence.

“As of the time of his arrest, a wooden box used to conceal illicit substances including 18 pinches of methamphetamine, one block and 71 wraps of cannabis, was recovered from him,” the spokesperson for the NDLEA, Femi Babafemi, revealed in a statement obtained by our correspondent on Sunday.

In other interdiction operations in Edo State, the NDLEA operatives on Monday, November 6, recovered 42 bags of cannabis weighing 480kgs from a camp in Aviosi forest in Owan West LGA, while the Utese forest in Ovia North East LGA was also raided the same day with 231.5kgs of the substance recovered and a cannabis farm measuring 0.778960 hectare destroyed.

In Adamawa State, operatives on a patrol along Ngurore-Yola Road on Thursday, November 9, intercepted a Toyota Corolla marked TZG 97 KY loaded with 30, 899 tramadol 225mg and 100mg pills concealed inside the body compartments of the car.

Babafemi noted that, “The driver found in possession of the drug exhibits, Sani Samaila (a.k.a Isa Male), 25, said he was bringing the consignment from Jalingo, Taraba State to deliver in Yola, Adamawa State.  The previous day, Wednesday, November 8, a suspect, Abdullahi Sani (a.k.a Danfulani), was arrested at Ngurore town in possession of some quantity of dried weeds suspected to be cannabis sativa in a white nylon.

“He thereafter led operatives on a follow-up operation to the home of a drug lord, Alhaji Bubakari (a.k.a Dan Mamuda), an unrepentant ex-convict, where 19 blocks of compressed cannabis that weighed 13kgs were recovered.”

Meanwhile, in Ogun State, no fewer than 18.875 tonnes of cannabis sativa on 7.55 hectares farmland were destroyed and another 100 jumbo bags weighing 1,100 kilograms of the psychoactive substance recovered at James town, Ogunmakin area of Obafemi Owode LGA on Monday, November 6, by a combined team of the NDLEA operatives with officers and men of the Nigerian Army, Nigeria Police Force, Federal Road Safety Corps, Defence Intelligence Agency and the State Security Network, Amotekun. Okpor Chukwuma and six other male suspects found on the farmland were arrested.

However, while a commercial bus driver, Olayinka Sowo, 25, was arrested on Friday, November 10 along the Ibadan-Akure Expressway over alleged conspiracy to transport 45.150kgs cannabis from Lagos to Osun State, the NDLEA officers in Abuja on the same day intercepted 7, 980 pills of diazepam and 567 bottles of codeine syrup in a commercial bus along Abaji-Abuja highway after which a follow-up operation at the Zuba motor park led to the arrest of the owner of the consignment, one Ugwu Ikenna, aged 30.

In Delta State, the NDLEA backed by men of the Nigerian Army stormed a remote forest in Umuchime community, Ndokwa West LGA where they destroyed 12.5 tonnes of cannabis on five hectares of farmland, and recovered 53.22kgs processed weeds and seeds of the substance.

Babafemi noted that a suspect, Christopher Anim (alias Ogidi), was also arrested in the course of the operation. Meanwhile, two suspects: Amarachukwu Eugene, 32, and Abdulaziz Auwal, 25, were arrested in another operation by operatives in Kano with 202 blocks of cannabis weighing 113.1kgs on Tuesday, November 7.

Punch