The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) yesterday arrested a man heading to Brazil with 23 wraps containing 34,000 US dollars hidden in his boxer shorts.
The agency’s head of Public Affairs, Mr Mitchell Ofoyeju made this public knowledge in Lagos, yseterday.
According to the statement released by the agency, the passenger whose name is Ozoh Ikenna was nabbed at the popular, Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos.
Ozoh’s arrested was made possible thanks to a screening machine that detected the stack of cash concealed in his boxer shorts this is according to NDLEA airport commander, Mr Ahmadu Garba.
The head of the directorate, Mrs Victoria Egbase added that:
“The wraps of dollars found on Ikenna were detected with the aid of scanning machine.
“We also conducted a follow-upoperation where one Ogbo Emmanuel who gave Ozoh the 34,000 dollars was arrested,” the commander is quoted as saying.
The statement said investigation activities conducted by the NDLEA’s Assets and Financial Investigation Directorate revealed that the suspects were involved in the laundering of substantial amount of illicit drug proceeds.
“We were able to trace over N226 million to one bank account belonging to the second suspect, Ogbo Emmanuel.
“The account name is Eternal God International Limited.”
Following the statement’s release a new discovery surfaced that proceeds from drug dealings were often been deposited in the said bank account by an international drug cartel members that operates in West-Africa and South-America.
NDLEA’s chairman, Mr Ahmadu Giade reiterated that the agency is bent on targeting criminal wealth.
“Asset forfeiture is one of the effective ways of responding to organised crime threats; we are working assiduously to trace and confiscate criminal wealth of drug syndicates.
Strategic efforts are on-going to prevent the entry of drug proceeds into legitimate economy and criminal financing,”
he said.
