Nigerians Stranded Overseas Tragically Go Into Ill Fated Drug Trade To Get Return Money

Nigerians stranded abroad are tragically dabbling ill fated drug trade to get return home fund.

Dayo Oketola and Punch bring this life wrecking trend to fore in this highly revealing put together.

Nnamdi Okpara had glanced at our correspondent around the Copacabana Palace Hotel in the vibrant Copacabana district in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was in October, 2009 and a curious journalist had taken a stroll to savour the beauty of the city’s trademark sidewalks, imposing landmark buildings, and the sprawling popular Copacabana Beach.

Our correspondent, who had also glanced at the young man, had continued to stroll on the sidewalks when a loud voice broke the silence. “Brother! Brother!! I know you are from Naija o,” he called out in pidgin. Our correspondent, who was utterly surprised at the ability of the young man to identify a fellow Nigerian 6,664 kilometres away from home, stopped, beckoned on the migrant and engaged in a tête-à-tête with him.

At age 19, Okpara had stowed away on a Portugal-bound ship from the Apapa port in Lagos. That was in 2008. There was no enough time to explain how he beat the security at the port before sneaking into the ship or who helped him, and how much he paid the illegal travel agent.

“I wanted to go to Portugal to try my luck there and improve on my condition,” he had said. “But the ship had a stopover here in Rio and I thought we had reached Portugal. One of the crew members who helped me stow away from Nigeria helped me to disembark. That was how I found myself in this city (Rio),” he added.

Okpara lamented the difficulty he was facing in Rio. Hence, he relied on menial jobs and sometimes begging from tourists to keep body and soul together. His life revolved around other Nigerians living in terrible conditions which made them susceptible to crimes, especially drug-related ones. The hope of getting a better job, he had said, became dim because he didn’t even finish secondary school before leaving Nigeria.

There are many Nigerians living in worse conditions like Okpara all over the world. The number of Nigerians living in the Diaspora has been estimated at 17 million. In fact, there is a claim that there is no country in the world where you will not find Nigerians. While many are doing very well, several others are living in extremely poor conditions and have become economic refugees wallowing in abject poverty in foreign lands. This sometimes drives them into untold criminal activities that eventually lead to arrest, detention, torture and occasional deaths.

A former Minister of Education, Prof. Ihechukwu Madubuike, had during the 2014 National Conference in Abuja, said 16,300 Nigerians were in foreign prisons. Three thousand, seven hundred and nineteen of them, all women, are said to be in Canadian prisons. Five hundred are in Brazilian jails; 752 in the United Kingdom prisons; 700 in Chinese cells and 96 in Indonesian prisons. Others are spread in other countries of the world and poor living condition, no doubt, had pushed them into crimes for which they have been arrested and jailed. Some have been executed while several others are on death row.

Though many Nigerians living abroad are believed to be stranded without the motivation and wherewithal to return home, some had braved the odds by joining drug cartels to make enough money to actualise their homecoming. The modus operandi, according to Saturday PUNCH’s findings, is that drug barons, who are able to identify these people due to the squalor under which they live, their hopelessness and desperation to return home, buy their travel tickets, while promising handsome rewards should they courier and deliver the drugs successfully.

One of such people is Ajaero Okechukwu Kingsley, 29, who hails from Abia State. He was arrested in August, 2015 at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport with cocaine on his way from Sao Paulo, Brazil.

The suspect, who excreted 44 wraps of substances that tested positive for cocaine and weighing 85 grammes, had abandoned his fashion designing business in Nigeria and travelled to Brazil in 2013 in “search of better working conditions” but got more than he bargained for as his two years’ sojourn in the South American country couldn’t give him the economic emancipation he had hoped for, hence, the foray into cocaine pushing.

He said, “This is my first time of trafficking in drugs and I got involved through friends. In line with my plan, I was expecting 30,000 euros as my profit. My business partner was to collect the drug from me while on transit in Qatar but he failed to show up. I was compelled to come to Nigeria with the drugs, but I excreted 30 wraps on board the aircraft.”

King Emeka Emehelu, 39, and Aduaka Chuka Christopher, 38, are automobile technician and baker respectively. They had both travelled to Brazil in search of greener pastures but failed, thus prompting the decision to return to Nigeria. They were, however, apprehended with cocaine at the Lagos airport a few months ago. Emehelu was caught with two parcels of cocaine that weighed 1.595kg hidden in his luggage, while Aduaka was found to have ingested five wraps of cocaine weighing 80 grammes. The cocaine had a combined weight of 2.395kg.

Emehelu said his one year sojourn in Brazil was a serious setback to his career as an automobile technician.

He said, “I am married with four children. I left Nigeria a year ago for Brazil. As a result of my poor living condition in Brazil, I spent one year without seeing my family in Nigeria. I accepted to smuggle cocaine for N1.2m. I wanted to use the money to establish a business for my wife who has been struggling to take care of my family since I left Nigeria.”

Aduaka, who also smuggled the cocaine to raise money, said, “I worked as a baker in Brazil for one year but the income was not enough to sustain me. I would have made N2m from this trip. The plan was for me to smuggle the drugs to Nigeria and share the proceeds with my sponsor. Unfortunately, I could only swallow five wraps because I was vomiting the drugs. They were disappointed in me for swallowing only five wraps. I regret getting involved in drug trafficking.”

27-year-old Ilo Chidera Alex smuggled 15.850kg of cocaine hidden inside make-up brushes from Brazil to Nigeria via the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja. However, his arrest by vigilant National Drug Law Enforcement Agency officials at the airport prevented him from pulling the N126m drug deal through.

Ilo, who hails from Enugu State, took off from Sao Paulo enroute Dubai to Abuja. He said he was stranded in Brazil and drug trafficking became his only option.

He said, “I went to Brazil in search of job opportunities. In the process, I was stranded because I had no job and money to sustain myself. That was how I met a man who promised to buy my flight ticket back to Nigeria. He gave me the bag of make-up brushes to take to
Nigeria and also promised to give me some money to start my own business. At the Abuja airport, the drug was discovered in my luggage.”

In the same vein, the NDLEA recently arrested 14 drug suspects at the Lagos airport with 33.655kg of narcotics. Eight of the suspects were caught while trying to smuggle cocaine into the country from Brazil and Argentina. They included Okafor Chijioke Franklin, 25, caught with 13.735kg of cocaine in tin food; Okeke Uchenna Aloy Pascal, 29, arrested with 3.425kg of cocaine absorbed in towels; Akpobome Godwin Ujunwa, 32, found with 1.730kg of cocaine absorbed in T-shirt; Ani Monday, 37, found with 300gm of cocaine; Madububa Amaechi Joseph, 38, who ingested 845gm of cocaine; Amuka Sunday, 26, who ingested 1.505kg of cocaine and Ijoganu Edache, 25, who also ingested 1.240kg of cocaine.

Four of the suspects were said to have been apprehended in one Royal Air Maroc flight on their way from Brazil. The estimated value of the drugs seized from them by NDLEA was about N300m.

Akpobome said he was promised the sum of N2m to smuggle 1.730kg of cocaine absorbed in a T-shirt from Argentina to Nigeria. Okafor was promised $10,000 while Nwakama would have been paid the sum of $5,000 if he had not been arrested at the airport.

Okafor, who had the largest quantity of drugs, was found in possession of 13.735kg of cocaine concealed inside tin foods on his way from Brazil.

He said, “I have no one to help me. I travelled to Brazil a year ago in search of job opportunities. I used to hawk toys in Brazil to sustain myself. A friend promised to pay for my ticket to Nigeria. He was the person that gave me the drugs packed inside tin foods.”

Nickolas Ohaebosun was selling ladies clothes in Dakar, Senegal before he got caught up in the drug trafficking web and was arrested at the Lagos airport with 2.175kg of narcotics. He said that he needed money to relocate his business to Nigeria.

“I wanted to come back to Nigeria and start a new life. I lived in Senegal for seven months. My condition of living was such that I was in dire need of financial help. I saw the drug deal as the only opportunity to revamp my dying business,” Ohaebosun stated.

The volume of illicit drug trade from South American countries particularly Brazil to West Africa, most especially Nigeria is alarming. The NDLEA Chairman/Chief Executive, Ahmadu Giade, recently confirmed this development by saying that “Brazil is a source country for cocaine” and promised that the NDLEA would continue to pay priority attention to passengers coming into Nigeria from the country.

“Those who seek to enrich themselves through drug trafficking shall be arrested and prosecuted,” he warned.

A 2012 report by the International Narcotics Control Board notes that Nigeria tops the list with the highest trafficking and drug use in West Africa. The report further states that in the last 10 years, West Africa became the new transit hub for cocaine coming from Latin America destined for Europe, with Nigeria’s commercial capital, Lagos emerging as the most active centre for air trafficking of cocaine. The report also notes that Nigeria is atop the list of major transit routes of heroin destined for Europe.

As a further proof of this development, a 32-year-old textile merchant, Emujue Chimaobi John Paul, was arrested with 5.745kg of cocaine hidden inside laptop bags on his way from Sao Paulo, Brazil, to Nigeria through the Lagos airport. The cocaine had an estimated street value of N57m.

Emujue, who dropped out of school in Junior Secondary School (JSSI) in 1998, said it was frustration that made him to venture into drug smuggling.

“I am a textile merchant. Since 2003, I have been dealing in textiles in Togo. In 2011, I relocated to Brazil in search of greener pastures,” he said, adding, “Unfortunately, my business did not flourish as I had expected. In fact, I was even living from hand to mouth. I was told that I could make enough money from drug trafficking to invest in my business. That was how I was convinced to give it a trial and I was arrested in the process.”

In an interview with Saturday PUNCH, Giade also confirmed that the cases of arrested Brazil returnees who smuggled cocaine into the country are still pending before the court.

According to him, any suspect arrested by the NDLEA is investigated and immediately charged to court.

He, however, said that while it is the statutory responsibility of NDLEA to arrest, investigate and prosecute drug offenders, it is the duty of the judiciary to pass judgement.

He explained that the light sentences for drug traffickers are counter-productive because so much resources are involved in getting information, carrying out surveillance and raid operations, investigating drug syndicates and ultimately prosecuting offenders.

Giade also told Saturday PUNCH that punishment for drug traffickers must commensurate with the gravity of drug offences.

He posited that justice would not be served if a trafficker caught with drugs worth several millions of naira gets a light sentence.

The NDLEA boss stated that while he would not advocate death sentence, culprits must get stiffer sentences to prevent them from going back to the crime and also deter others from the criminal act.

According to him, the NDLEA is appealing most light sentences and many of such cases have been diligently pursued even to the apex court.