‘Money made us insert cocaine into our anuses’

• NDLEA seizes N15m drugs, truck

Two men, Okechukwu Okonkwo and Lucky Ifedigbo, have told officials of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), why they inserted wraps of cocaine into their anuses. 

This came as the agency said it arrested a truck conveying three tons of drugs in Yola, Adamawa State.
But Okonkwo (44) and Ifedigbo (37) had different stories to tell on why they embraced drug trafficking. The suspects inserted seven wraps of cocaine each, weighing 350 grams into their alimentary canals to evade arrest.
Okonkwo said that he accepted to smuggle drugs because of frustration and also because he needed money to leave Brazil. On the other hand, Ifedigbo said he became a drug courier because he was looking at the profit margin. NDLEA agents arrested the suspects at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA) Lagos, on Nigeria-Brazil route.
They were arrested during the inward screening of passengers on a Royal Air Maroc flight from Sao Paulo, Brazil through Casablanca, Morocco. The agency recovered 700g of powdery substance that tested positive for cocaine from the two suspects.
Okonkwo said: “I was stranded in Brazil where I worked as a waiter in a restaurant for two years. Life was awful as I struggled daily to feed myself. When I was contacted to smuggle cocaine to Nigeria, I was very happy because it was an opportunity to return home.
My sponsor also promised to pay me N500,000, with which I had planned to start a business.” Ifedigbo, who has also spent two years in Brazil, described his arrest as a stroke of ill-luck.He said: “I’m a businessman. I import female shoes from Brazil since 2014.
This arrest is just bad luck for me because I was already calculating my profit from the deal.” But the Adamawa State Commander of NDLEA, Mr. Yakubu Kibo, said yesterday that the three tons of the drug with estimated street value of N15 million, was neatly concealed in 220 cartons in the truck.
He said: “The team of NDLEA operatives on Yola-Numan Road on August 22 intercepted a Mercedes Benz container truck with registration number XA 673 WSH for a search. “The search revealed three tons and 80 kilograms of stopcof Lictus Cough Syrup with codeine concealed in 220 cartons in the truck.” Kibo added that the driver and his assistant claimed that the goods belonged to a pharmaceutical company.
According to the commander, the suspects, after interrogation, told the command that they were en route from Minna, Niger State to Jalingo, Taraba State. Kibo, however, said that investigation revealed that there was no fixed address for the delivery of the said 220 cartons of the cough syrup with codeine.
He said: “This goes show that the movement of the substance was with criminal intention and investigation is going to unveil the truth of the matter.”https://newtelegraphonline.com/money-made-us-insert-cocaine-anuses/