NDLEA smashes drug cartels, recovers cocaine, others

A cocaine trafficking cartel headed by a couple, Bolanle Lookman Dauda and Olayinka Toheebat Dauda, has been smashed in Lagos and Ogun states by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) with multi-billion naira worth of the illicit drug recovered in two operations following the arrest of the kingpin and his wife. Mr […]

A cocaine trafficking cartel headed by a couple, Bolanle Lookman Dauda and Olayinka Toheebat Dauda, has been smashed in Lagos and Ogun states by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) with multi-billion naira worth of the illicit drug recovered in two operations following the arrest of the kingpin and his wife.

Mr Femi Babafemi, spokesman of the agency, on Tuesday in a statement, said the duo were arrested on Saturday, May 25, 2024, by operatives with the support of the Drug Enforcement Administration of the United States in Ibiye, along the Lagos-Badagry Expressway while attempting to cross the land border to deliver the consignment in Ghana.

The statement reads in part, “At the point of their arrest, 42 blocks of the Class A drug weighing 47.5kg were found on them. A swift follow up operation in their residence at Plot 24/25 OPIC Extension, Petedo Road, Agbara, Ogun State, led to the recovery of additional eight blocks of the same drug weighing 10kg, bringing the total weight of the cocaine seized from the couple to 57.5kg.”

In another raid by the special operation unit, no fewer than 1,100 ampoules of a lethal synthetic opioid, fentanyl, weighing 6.48kg, were recovered from a member of a drug trafficking syndicate, 34-year-old Ikeh Stanley Ifeanyi, at the popular Idumota Market in Lagos Island.

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Also, no less than 790 ampoules of the opioid weighing 5.273kg were seized from another member of the fentanyl syndicate, 48-year-old Chieze Ogechukwu Benjamin, who was also arrested at the Idumota Market.

Two other persons, Olayiwola Aremu Kazeem (37); and Ogunfowora Taofik Ajibola (35), were arrested on Lagos Island in a different raid by NDLEA officers with 432g of methamphetamine recovered from them.