The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested a Chinese businessman, Liang Tak You, along with an 80-year-old grandmother, Mrs. Grace Ekpeme, in a nationwide crackdown that uncovered consignments of Colorado—a potent synthetic cannabis—hidden in moimoi sachets, and Canadian Loud concealed within imported canned food.
This was revealed in a statement issued on Sunday in Abuja by the NDLEA’s Director of Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi.
According to Babafemi, Liang was apprehended on Friday at the arrival hall of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos, based on credible intelligence.
“The suspect, who arrived in Nigeria from Bangkok via Dubai on an Emirates Airlines flight, is a Chinese national, naturalised and based in Malaysia. “He reportedly travelled to Thailand to pick up two suitcases containing 50 parcels of Loud, weighing 26.10kg, before flying to Nigeria”, Babafemi stated.
He explained that NDLEA operatives, who had been tracking Tak You from his port of departure, allowed him to pass through immigration and other airport protocols before arresting him on his way out of the airport.
“In a separate incident, the octogenarian, Mrs. Grace Ekpeme, was arrested in the early hours of Saturday, July 26, at Edet-Nsa Street, Base Site, Calabar South, Cross River State, with over 3kg of skunk, following intelligence reports on her drug trafficking activities.
“Also in Lagos, NDLEA operatives on Wednesday, July 23, intercepted a suspect, Chidi Agbafo, along the Epe–Ajah Expressway while transporting consignments of 21.7kg of Colorado—some of which were packaged in moimoi cooking sachets—and 3.8 litres of codeine-based syrup in a commercial bus en route to Warri and Oghara in Delta State.
“At the Apapa seaport in Lagos, a joint examination by NDLEA officers, Customs personnel, and other security agencies on Friday, July 25, uncovered 101kg of Canadian Loud. The drugs were factory-packed in 202 tins of imported food items labelled ‘Bean Salad Mix’ and concealed in two Toyota Sienna buses inside a container that originated from Canada”, the statement added.
