Osuoha Iheanacho arrested at airport after ingesting 90 wraps of cocaine

By Isa Isawade

Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA, have arrested a 50-year-old businessman, Osuoha Christian Iheanacho, at the Akanu Ibiam International Airport, AIIA, Enugu, for ingesting 90 wraps of cocaine.

Osuoha was intercepted on Wednesday 20th November 2024 at the arrival hall of the Enugu airport during the inbound screening of passengers arriving from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on an Ethiopian airlines flight following months of intelligence and surveillance on him.

He was subsequently placed on excretion observation during which he egested 90 pellets of cocaine weighing 2.019 kilograms in seven excretions.

Speaking on the arrest, NDLEA’s media officer Femi Babafemi stated that the suspect who operates phone and accessories business in Lagos and Gabon, Central Africa, travelled by road from Gabon to Douala, Cameroon from where he took a flight to Addis Ababa where he swallowed the pellets of cocaine while in transit and thereafter continued his journey to Enugu with Lagos as his final destination.

Babafemi said: “He deliberately complicated his movement to distort traces of his travel history unknown to him that he has been on NDLEA watchlist for the past three months.”

In his statement, Osuoha said he desperately needed the money from the criminal drug trade to boost his declining phone and accessories business.

In Rivers state, NDLEA operatives at the Port Harcourt Ports complex, Onne, on Thursday 21st November also intercepted two containers of imported opioids during a joint examination with men of Customs Service and other security agencies.

A total of 168,000 bottles of codeine based syrup worth One Billion One Hundred and Seventy Six Million Naira (N1,176,000,000) only in street value, were recovered from one of the containers while the second one contains Four Million Five Hundred Thousand (4,500,000) pills of super royal tramadol 225mg valued at Three Billion One Hundred and Fifty Million Naira (N3,150,000,000) only, bringing the combined value of both the codeine and tramadol consignments to Four Billion Three Hundred and Twenty Six Million Naira (N4,326,000,000) only.

In Ekiti state, NDLEA operatives on Sunday 17th November arrested a 50-year-old physically challenged woman, Mustapha Boja, with 286 grams of Colorado and Loud strains of cannabis at Araromi street, Ikere-Ekiti, while 64kg of cannabis sativa was recovered at Akinyele motor park, Ibadan, Oyo state on Thursday 21st November.

Not less than 1,200.5 kilograms of same psychoactive substance were seized during raids by NDLEA officers in parts of Edo state. At Utese forest in Ovia North East LGA, 463.5kg was recovered on Thursday 21st November; while 507kg was seized at a compound in Owan village, Ovia LGA where the duo of David Ojo Ederin, 60, and Afoje Frank, 24, were arrested on Friday 22nd November. Another suspect, Godwin Okhoya, 40, was nabbed with 230kg of same substance at Okpuje, Owan West LGA.

In Kano, four suspects: Usman Sani, 25; Abdul Mohd, 28; Bunu Ali,27; and Umar Musa, 30, were on Tuesday 19th November arrested by NDLEA operatives at Gadar Tamburawa, Zaria- Kano road, with 100 blocks of cannabis weighing 45kg, while Ayuba Umar Zaranda, 55, was nabbed with 124kg cannabis at Pengana village, Toro LGA, Bauchi state.