Juliet Jacob Ochenje
The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has uncovered illicit importation of over 55,000 tablets of tramadol, 94,000 capsules of Omeprazole, a brand of a gastro resistant drug, as well as 326,100 millimetres bottles of cough syrup with codeine.
Speaking on Channels Television on Wednesday, the Comptroller of Tincan Island Port Command (TIOC), Adekunle Oloyede, said the discovery was intelligence driven discovery by the operatives stationed there.
He said the country of origin of the items is India, with the two containers of controlled drugs concealed in packages containing electrical items and chilli cutters.
“During examination, we found that they were pharmaceutical, unregistered and probably prohibited.
“This is something that NAFDAC should have given a permit but going by the way it was declared, they actually knew what they were doing. This is pure concealment and under our laws, we don’t allow such so after examination, we decided to do a sting operation on the importers of this goods and we arrested one of the suspects. Then we did a sting on the address and we found the importer. He confessed to be the owner of the two containers,”Oloyede explained.
He also added that the command also made recovery of 50 million naira from the suspects, allegedly to bribe the officers. He told them he wanted his freedom and the release of the containers and offered some 50 million naira, which the second day, he called the bureau de’ change and the brought in equivalent of $54,330 at an exchange of 920 per dollar.
“The exhibit is there, the suspects are here, because we have taken their statements and we still expect more statements and probably further investigation to see maybe we could always get more people involved in these kinds of importation.”
