NDLEA raids tramadol cartel, seizes over N5bn drugs in warehouse

The operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) have raided another tramadol cartel and seized millions of opioids pills and bottles worth over N5 billion from their warehouse in the Amuwo Odofin area of Lagos State.

The NDLEA operatives also arrested two of the kingpins.

This was disclosed via a statement issued on Sunday by the spokesperson of the anti-drug agency, Femi Babafemi.

Babafemi noted that NDLEA officers, on Tuesday, intercepted an imported consignment of Loud, a strong variant of cannabis, weighing 4, 878.72 kilograms along Awolowo Road in the Ikoyi area of Lagos.

He stated that anti-narcotics officers, after a near-fatal encounter with some suspected fake security agents escorting the drugs, succeeded in recovering the consignment with a white truck marked BDG 548 XX conveying it.

According to him, this was followed by the seizure of 121,630 pills of pharmaceutical opioids and some quantity of Molly from a dealer, Charles Okeke on Wednesday at the Idumota area of Lagos Island.

Babafemi disclosed that the NDLEA operatives, on Friday 13, tracked and located a major warehouse for pharmaceutical opioids at 17 Sir Ben Onyeka street, off Ago palace way in the Amuwo Odofin area of Lagos, noting that the owner of the store, Aloysius Okeke, was arrested.

The NDLEA spokesperson said the illicit drugs recovered from the warehouse include 3,264,630 pills of tramadol; 3,490 bottles of codeine, and 915,000 capsules of pregabalin 300mg.

He stated that the recovery came on the heels of the arrest of a suspect, Olarenwaju Lawal Wahab, who distributed for the cartel the same day.

Babafemi revealed that the items recovered from the suspect’s white Mercedes distribution bus were 14,690 bottles of codeine-based syrup; 402,500 tablets of Tramadol 250mg; 50,000 tablets of Tramadol 225mg, and 210,000 capsules of pregabalin 300mg.

Speaking on the arrests and seizures, the NDLEA Chairman/Chief Executive, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Retd), charged the officers of the anti-drug agency and their compatriots across the country to sustain the heat on drug cartels in Nigeria while balancing their efforts on supply reduction with drug demand reduction activities.

The Star