The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency has dealt another crippling blow to transnational organised crime by dismantling a sophisticated Nigerian-Mexican methamphetamine production syndicate, the agency’s Chairman has announced.
NDLEA Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (rtd), disclosed the major operational success at a media briefing in Abuja on Wednesday.
Marwa said that following months of painstaking intelligence gathering, operatives of the agency’s Special Operations Unit launched well-coordinated strikes across Ogun and Lagos States within a space of 48 hours last week.
The primary target was a remote farm in Abidagba Forest, Ijebu East Local Government Area of Ogun State, which was being used as a massive clandestine methamphetamine laboratory. Simultaneously, another tactical team closed in on the mastermind’s luxury residence in the Lekki area of Lagos State, where the drug baron, Anochili Innocent, was arrested.
At the forest laboratory, operatives apprehended seven key members of the cartel, including three Mexican nationals brought into the country specifically to cook the deadly substance, alongside four Nigerian collaborators.
The operation yielded a massive 2,419.48 kilograms of chemical materials, including highly toxic and crystallised methamphetamine worth an estimated $362.9 million in the international market, translating to over N480 billion.
Marwa described the seizure as the largest multi-billion naira meth haul in history.
Relentless follow-up operations led NDLEA operatives to another property owned by the baron in Lakowe, Lekki, where another key member of the syndicate was arrested. Investigators later stormed the residence of another syndicate member whose property served as the cartel’s strategic stash house.
Marwa warned that the dismantling of the cartel sends an unequivocal message to drug barons both locally and internationally that Nigeria is a hostile territory for their criminal business, adding that the agency will continue to hunt them down wherever they are located.
He urged Nigerians to remain vigilant and report suspicious activities, strange chemical odours, or unusual movements in their localities. The war is for the soul of the nation, and the agency will not back down until it achieves a drug-free Nigeria, he said.
