The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has cautioned travellers against assisting others with their luggage without knowing the content, News About Nigeria reports.
This warning came after the agency apprehended individuals who unknowingly transported illicit substances in their luggage.
Femi Babafemi, the spokesperson for NDLEA, shared the cautionary message on his social media account, citing recent incidents where travellers were caught with bottles of codeine syrup in luggage they had agreed to transport for others.
He urged the public to refrain from accepting luggage from unfamiliar sources.
“A PhD student and another student studying abroad got into custody cos bottles of codeine syrup were found in the luggage they picked for their female friend abroad,” Babafemi wrote.
“They’d have been jailed if NDLEA Nigeria had not worked hard to ensure the owner was put on the next flight home.
“Reason why we warn you not to take any luggage you don’t know its content from anyone.”
Babafemi also disclosed that NDLEA operatives successfully arrested three kingpins belonging to an international drug trafficking cartel.
The agency had been tracking the activities of the syndicate, which operated across Nigeria, South Africa, Mozambique, Europe, and America, for over two months.
The breakthrough followed the seizure of a significant consignment of heroin at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos.
The illicit substance, concealed in metal cutting machines, weighed a total of 51.90 kilograms.
Additionally, operatives recovered 69 compressed blocks of cannabis weighing 36kg in Bayelsa state and intercepted a vehicle carrying 1,250,000 pills of opioids weighing 450kg in Adamawa state.
Further operations led to the arrest of criminals involved in drug trafficking across various states in Nigeria.
In Imo state, one person was apprehended while attempting to take delivery of 49 bottles of codeine syrup, while in Ondo state, NDLEA officers raided a cannabis farm, destroyed 25,000 kilograms of the substance, and recovered an additional 89.5kg.
Babafemi stated that Buba Marwa, the NDLEA chairman, commended the efforts of the agency’s officers and encouraged them to intensify their fight against drug trafficking.
