Thursday, March 28, 2024

Hemp dealers device new means of trafficking

  • Ferry consignment on night buses

Indian hemp growers and traffickers have deviced new means of plying their illicit trade as many of the night buses plying the Lagos-Abuja-Kano routes have become transportation media for their illicit consignments up-North.

Unsuspecting drivers of some of the buses are said to have always loaded the illicit drugs, usually concealed in cartons, into their vehicles for onward transportation to their destinations, where a points man usually wait to receive the packages.

Their points of loading, according to findings by The Point, include such places as Jibowu-Yaba, Oyingbo, Ojota and Ojodu-Berger motor parks in Lagos.

The Point gathered that when the Nastional Drug Law Enforcemnt Agency came under a deluge of complaints, “its leadership decided to step up security with a view to nipping it in the bud.”

According to a source close to the Shaw Road, Ikoyi Lagos office of the NDLEA, ”In the morning of Friday last week, a bus belonging to a popular transporter was loaded with Indian hemp and passengers alike at Jibowu, on its way to Abuja. Unknown to the driver, who had been paid extra money, NDLEA had planted an informer in the bus, who monitored the goings-on.

“It was a jolly ride, until the driver got to Gwagwalada, from where the informer tipped them off. “As the bus approached a snaky point, narcotic officers attached to the Gwagwalada area of Abuja flagged down the bus, made a surprise confiscation of the contraband that was neatly hidden in a big carton inside the luxury bus.

“The owner of the carton that contained about 50kg of hemp, neither owned up nor showed up when the officer asked for the owner at about 8.00 a.m. The carton that contained the drug was swiftly seized and taken to their station after conferring with the driver. Then, two of the uniformed officers were detailed to follow the driver to their park at Utako, apparently for further investigations.”

A lady attached to the customer care unit of the transport company, who simply identified herself as Ms Barba, said she was not competent to comment on the incident. However, spokesperson of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, Mr. Mitchel Ofoyeju, said that the transport company “is under strict investigation”, though he did not give further details.

Ofoyeju said that narcotics officers had been deployed in the “appropriate places to check/ intercept items suspected to be drugs. “There is no hiding place for the ungodly. We shall continue to raid, arrest, prosecute and confiscate drugs, no matter where they are hidden. “We have trained dogs that are capable of sniffing out drugs concealed anywhere. Just watch and see”

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