By Amofokhai Williams
It was a stormy week for Nigeria’s drug underworld as the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) unleashed a wave of coordinated crackdowns that rattled syndicates from the northern forests to the southern cities.
In a sweeping operation that captured the imagination of the nation, the agency dismantled networks, arrested traffickers ranging from a frail-looking grandfather to a trigger-happy cannabis farmer, and destroyed a staggering 178,750 kilograms of skunk hidden in Taraba’s Mayodoga forest.
The raids painted a chilling picture of the sheer scale of Nigeria’s narcotics problem and the audacity of traffickers who, despite their disguises and tactics, fell one by one to NDLEA’s dragnet.
According to a statement issued by NDLEA‘s spokesman, Femi Babafemi, in Anambra, the spotlight fell on Uchelue Ikechukwu, a 75-year-old man who became an unlikely poster figure of drug trafficking.
Far from the stereotype of a frail elder, Ikechukwu was found with 26.7kg of skunk, his arrest sending shockwaves through his community.
NDLEA operatives said his age offered no shield, and his case underscored how the drug trade lures even the elderly into its shadows.
From the farms of Niger State came another bizarre tale: 30-year-old cannabis farmer, Alfa Andrew, who cultivated a sprawling 71.5-hectare marijuana farm, defended his narcotics empire with a Dane gun.
His reign ended abruptly when NDLEA stormed his fields, uprooting the crops and destroying every stalk. The once-thriving illegal farm was left in ashes, its keeper marched off in chains.
Perhaps the most sensational bust came in Ekiti, where operatives closed in on a feared cartel kingpin whose syndicate had long supplied the region with exotic strains of drugs.
The operation led to the recovery of the state’s single largest consignment of Loud, Colorado, and methamphetamine ever recorded. According to NDLEA sources, the takedown of the cartel head sent ripples through the state’s underworld, silencing a major artery of supply.
Along the Kaduna–Maiduguri route, NDLEA officers intercepted a fuel tanker packed with 104,900 tramadol capsules, carefully concealed and reportedly destined for insurgent strongholds.
In another operation in Borno, operatives recovered 502,280 opioid pills ingeniously hidden in refrigerators and animal feed sacks.
Meanwhile, a sting in Kano revealed the financial backbone of a northern trafficking cell: ₦8 million in crisp ₦200 notes, believed to be proceeds of illicit drug sales.
The cash seizure highlighted how narcotics not only devastate lives but also fuel underground economies that thrive in parallel to the state.
The climax of the week-long operations came in Taraba’s Mayodoga forest. Here, NDLEA operatives destroyed 178,750kg of skunk, a seizure so massive that officials described it as a “blow from which traffickers will not recover easily.”
Witnesses reported the forest engulfed in smoke as tonnes of cannabis went up in flames, the operation marking one of the largest single-day hauls in the agency’s history.
NDLEA Chairman, Brig. Gen. Buba Marwa (Rtd.), praised the operatives for their relentlessness, warning that no trafficker, whether “an old grandfather hiding behind his years, a gun-toting farmer, or a cartel kingpin”—can outrun the law.
He declared: “We will chase them from the forests, stop them on the highways, track them in their hideouts, and uproot their farms. The long arm of the law will always catch up with them.”
