Need To Curb Expansion Of The Cocaine Market In Africa

*On Thursday, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) last week raised the alarm over the potential for the expansion of the cocaine market in Africa and Asia. ROLAND OGBONNAYA writes on how the new development will impact the efforts of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA)

In recent times, the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), a body established by the federal government to fight drug trafficking and its related crimes has been making some successes with the harvest of arrests and drug seizures. The latest was the arrest of a rehabilitated ex-fighter of the Boko Haram terror group, Alayi Madu and the traditional ruler of Kajola, a border community between Ondo and Edo States, Baale Akinola Adebayo are among 37 persons with the seizure of over 2.2 tonnes of illicit drugs by operatives of the NDLEA at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos and in raids across 12 states in the penultimate week.

The anti-narcotics agency spokesman, Femi Babafemi last Sunday said as part of ongoing operations to mop up illicit drugs across the country ahead of the next round of elections, NDLEA officers in the early hours of last Friday stormed Kajola forest in Kajola community, a border town between Edo and Ondo states where they destroyed three cannabis farms measuring 39.8 hectares. He said the owner of the farms who claims to be the Ba’ale of Kajola, Akinola Adebayo, 35, was arrested on the farm at 2:30 am, while two other suspects believed to be his workers—Arikuyeri Abdulrahman, 23, and Habibu Ologun, 25—were also nabbed in a hut near the farms.

Babafemi also revealed that a 26-year-old Alayi Madu, who was a Boko Haram fighter for 15 years before he surrendered to the Nigerian military in 2021 was intercepted by NDLEA operatives last Thursday along Abuja-Kaduna express road with 10 kilogrammes of skunk, which he said he bought in Ibadan, Oyo state and was taking the consignment concealed in a sack to Maiduguri, Borno State.

Madu, in his statement, said he is from Banki town, Borno State and joined the notorious terrorist organisation, in 2006 when he was just nine years old, but repented and surrendered to the military in 2021, after which he underwent rehabilitation and de-radicalisation processes at Umaru Shehu rehabilitation centre, Maiduguri and Malam Sidi de-radicalisation centre, Gombe. He was subsequently discharged after spending six months and thereafter travelled to Ibadan, Oyo State where he worked as a commercial motorcycle rider (Okada rider) before going into drug trafficking and his eventual arrest along Abuja-Kaduna express road.

Babafemi said at the Lagos Airport in Ikeja, operatives acting on intelligence intercepted a consignment of 11.90 kilogrammes of heroin and 500 grammes of skunk concealed in deep freezers, which were part of a cargo that arrived from South Africa onboard Ethiopian airline via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He said the agency’s sniffer dogs were deployed to locate where the illicit drugs were hidden in the cargo and in no time, identified the cartons packed in the deep freezers.

He added that a total of four suspects, Dairo Quam; Oluwaseun Ogunmene; Adeleke Abdulrasaq; Bamidele Adewale and Oluwafemi Ogunmeru who played active roles in the movement of the drugs and a truck driver have been arrested so far in connection with the seizure.

In the massive effort to dismantle the drugs market in Nigeria and Africa, NDLEA operatives attached to the Gate C departure hall of the MMIA last Thursday intercepted a passenger, Aigbedion Philomena heading to Italy via Addis Ababa on an Ethiopian Airline flight. Her bags containing body cream, hair attachments, drinks, and some food items were searched, and a total of 1.2 kilogrammes of tramadol capsules concealed inside gift wrapping sheets and covered with old daily newspapers were discovered.

At the Idiroko land border, NDLEA operatives acting on intelligence last Thursday intercepted a commercial Toyota Camry Salon Car with reg. number JJJ 756 HB (Lagos) along Ilase-Akoko road, Idiroko with 34 compressed jumbo-size wraps of imported skunk weighing 17 kilogrammes and concealed in two cooking gas cylinders. Two suspects in the car, Benjamin Ajose, 48 and Oluwatobiloba Ajayi, 37, were arrested.

In Akwa Ibom State also, Mrs. Hope Iniobong, 42, was arrested with bags of cannabis sativa weighing 1,112 kilogrammes (1.1 tonnes) in her house at Ediene Abak in Abak local government area, while operatives in Kogi state last Thursday recovered 25 cartons, containing 50,000 ampoules of pentazocine injection weighing 200 kilogrammes in a Toyota Hiace bus marked LAM 652 LG, Kogi, travelling from Lagos to Abuja.

In Ogun state, operatives arrested a female drug dealer, Bola Egbebi in Ota local government area, with different quantities of cannabis sativa, methamphetamine, tramadol 225, skuchies, molly and codeine cough syrup, while in Gombe State, another female drug dealer, Fatima Hassan (a.k.a Boss) was arrested last Saturday in her house at New Mile 3 area of Akko local government area with three and a half blocks of skunk weighing 3.245 kilogrammes, two other female drug dealers: Folake Ladipo and Adeola Babatunde were arrested with 49.5 kilogrammes skunk last Friday in Mushin area of Lagos state.

In Kwara, operatives on patrol along the Ilorin-Jebba highway last Tuesday arrested two suspects: Ismaila Saidu and Dahiru Abdullahi with 50 bags of cannabis sativa weighing 578 kilogrammes, while in the FCT Abuja, 15 suspects were transferred by the Nigerian Army with 35 bags of cannabis weighing 384.3 kilogrammes. A 56-year-old suspect, Shinayemà Kelenku was arrested at Tse-kelenku village, Logo local government area of Benue State with 36.7 kilogrammes skunk, while in Delta state, operatives intercepted a suspect, Chimeze Ndukaire, 56, conveying psychotropic substances worth over N30 million in a white Toyota Hiace bus with registration number Lagos FST 279 XS coming from Onitsha to Warri. The vehicle was intercepted last Friday at G.S.M Junction, Asaba based on a tip-off, and recovered from the bus including 267.3 litres of codeine (2,673 bottles); 25,110 pills of tramadol and other opioids.

In Kano State, NDLEA operatives last Saturday raided the Sabon-gari area of Kano where they arrested a suspect, Chukwuebuka Christopher and recovered from him 7,740 bottles of Codeine based syrup, measuring 774 litres, concealed inside 43 sacks of garlic.

Encouraged by the success of, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of NDLEA, Brig. Gen. Buba Marwa (rtd) commended the officers, men and women of MMIA, Idiroko, Edo, Kaduna, Akwa Ibom, Kogi, Ogun, Gombe, Lagos, Kwara, FCT, Benue, Delta and Kano Commands of the agency for their diligence and commitment to work, however, charged them and their compatriots across other commands not to rest on their oars. He said their efforts agree with the agency’s objectives to rid the country of illicit drugs.

His commendation was coming at the time the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) raised the alarm over the potential for the expansion of the cocaine market in Africa and Asia. The UNODC, in a new report on Thursday, also decried the growing cultivation of coca bush and improvements in the process of converting coca bush to cocaine hydrochloride, warning that West and Central Africa are increasingly being used as key transit zones for the drug.

The new report released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), read: “Global production of cocaine has jumped dramatically over the past two years following an initial slowdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.” The Global Report on Cocaine 2023 details how coca cultivation soared 35 per cent from 2021 to 2022, a record high and the sharpest year-to-year increase since 2016, with the rise being a result of both an expansion in coca bush cultivation and improvements in the process of converting coca bush to cocaine hydrochloride.

According to the report, the steep growth in supply has been matched by a similar swelling in demand, with many regions showing a steady rise in cocaine users over the past decade. While the cocaine market remains quite concentrated in the Americas and parts of Europe, the report warns that there is a strong potential for a large expansion in Africa and Asia. Nevertheless, interceptions of cocaine shipments by law enforcement around the world have also risen sharply, with seizures reaching a record high of nearly 2,000 tons in 2021.

“The surge in the global cocaine supply should put all of us on high alert,” stated UNODC Executive Director Ghada Waly in reacting to these findings. “The potential for the cocaine market to expand in Africa and Asia is a dangerous reality. I urge governments and others to closely examine the report’s findings to determine how this transnational threat can be met with transnational responses based on awareness raising, prevention, and international and regional cooperation.”

The report examines the emergence of new hubs for cocaine trafficking, noting that countries in Southeastern Europe and Africa – particularly those in West and Central Africa – are increasingly being used as key transit zones for the drug. Ports on the North Sea like Antwerp, Rotterdam, and Hamburg, meanwhile, have eclipsed traditional entry points in Spain and Portugal for cocaine arriving in Western Europe. Traffickers are also diversifying their routes in Central America by sending more and more cocaine to Europe, in addition to North America.

The modalities of cocaine traffickers are also examined in the report, with findings showing that the criminal landscape is fragmenting into a myriad of trafficking networks. The demobilization of fighters from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) – who had previously controlled many of Colombia’s coca-growing regions – created an opening for others to step in, such as new, local actors; ex-FARC guerillas; or even foreign groups from Mexico and Europe. Additionally, the report revealed that so-called “service providers”, especially the specialised groups that lend their services at all stages of the supply chain for a fee, have proliferated.

“With its latest knowledge and trends on the routes, modalities, and networks employed by criminal actors,” noted Angela Me, chief of the Research and Analysis Branch at UNODC, “I hope that the report will support evidence-based strategies which stay ahead of future developments in cocaine production, trafficking, and use.”

It’s not only Gen. Marwa and his men that are optimistic that the fight will be won, the Director-General of the National Council for Arts and Culture, Chief Olusegun Runsewe, recently expressed the optimism that within a short time, but the issue of illicit drug trafficking would also become a thing of the past and Nigeria would be respected globally among the comity of nations.

*Independent