The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) would appear to have pulled off a damage control feat in redeeming Nigeria’s image, damaged by a recent United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes report that named the nation “a transit point for heroin and cocaine.” It said since 2004 “drug traffickers have been increasingly using West African countries, including Nigeria, for smuggling large amounts of cocaine from South America into Europe and North America. The country has a relatively high rate of drug abuse due to the continued availability of illicitly manufactured and diverted pharmaceutical products containing narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances.”
That adverse report appeared to have awoken the national anti drug agency to its responsibility and the result looks salutary. It announced, Tuesday, the seizure and closure of 286 assets and 600 bank accounts of drug barons between January 2021 and last August. NDLEA spokesman, Femi Babafemi said the assets consisted of 249 exotic cars and 37 mansions. He said the assets consisted of “249 exotic vehicles and 37 properties forfeited, all scattered across the country.”
The NDLEA also indicated that it seized N871.53m worth of illegal drug funds between January 2021 and August 2022. It explained that N619.12m was recorded as final illegal drug funds forfeiture and N252.41m as interim forfeiture. The agency grouped this under its drug supply reduction effort where it revealed that it arrested 18,940 suspected drug traffickers from January 2021 to July 2022. It explained: “The Agency’s drug supply reduction efforts recorded the following: the arrest of 18,940 suspected drug traffickers (comprising 17,444 males and 1,496 females and including 12 barons) from January 2021 to July 2022; conviction of 2,904 offenders to various jail terms in court; seizure of 3. 6 million kilograms of narcotic and psychotropic substances; cannabis farm destruction: 691 hectares of cannabis farms were detected and destroyed across six states.”
The NDLEA, however, admitted that it was confronted by an “overwhelming task of drug control in a country with an exceptionally high prevalence of drug abuse of 14.4 per cent.” in the light of the enormity of the task, the seizures made in such a short time amounted to a major breakthrough. However, Nigerians would have loved to know who and what the barons were as well as if they lived in the country or abroad. Were politicians also involved?
That last query is important because of the elections coming up next year. If politicians were among the arrests, they should be stopped from using their ill-gotten wealth to get to power. This is why we urge the NDLEA to name names. That it hasn’t done that is not good enough. If it believes it has a watertight case against any politician, they should be publicly shamed through prosecution.
That said, we want the NDLEA to avoid the mistake of the past in letting seized properties go to waste. It should obtain necessary court papers that empower it to sell the proceeds of illicit drugs and the funds so raised should go into the treasury. This way the nation will get value for the costly anti drug effort.
