A 41-year-old Canadian woman, Adrienne Munju, has been arrested by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency for attempting to smuggle a large consignment of synthetic cannabis, known as ‘Canadian Loud,’ into Nigeria.
The arrest occurred at Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, during the clearance of passengers arriving on a KLM flight from Canada on October 3, 2024.
NDLEA spokesperson, Femi Babafemi, confirmed the arrest in a statement released on Sunday, detailing that a joint examination of the suspect’s luggage uncovered 74 parcels of the illegal substance, weighing 35.20 kilograms, concealed in two of her three bags. This was Adrienne’s first trip to Nigeria.
Babafemi stated, “The suspect confessed that she was recruited online to traffic the drugs for $10,000 Canadian dollars, which she intended to use to fund her ongoing master’s degree in Canada.”
In addition to the airport seizure, NDLEA agents made several other major drug-related busts. On October 2 and 3, 2024, at the Port Harcourt Ports Onne in Rivers State, 13.3 million opioid pills—including Tramadol, Tramaking Quick Action Tramadol, Tamol-X, and Royal Tapentadol—alongside over 338,000 bottles of codeine syrup, valued at over N9 billion, were confiscated from containers originating from India.
“At Tincan seaport in Lagos, 100 parcels of Canadian Loud weighing 50kg were also intercepted on October 3. The drugs were concealed in a container with four imported vehicles from Canada,” Babafemi disclosed.
A suspect, Abubakar Shuaibu Ibrahim, has been arrested in connection with this seizure, which was traced to a warehouse in Ikorodu.
In another operation on October 3, NDLEA officers in Taraba State intercepted a commercial bus traveling from Onitsha to Jalingo. Inside the vehicle, 80 blocks of cannabis, hidden within bags of garri, were found. Two suspects, Pako Thomas and Emmanuel Anyigor, were arrested during the operation. In a separate incident, Chibuzor Okafor was arrested in Wukari for trafficking 38kg of cannabis, also hidden in garri bags.
Babafemi further reported that on October 4, 2024, NDLEA operatives arrested Bolanle Ajenifuja in Ojo, Lagos, recovering 700 liters of a drug cocktail known as ‘skuchies,’ along with three suspects identified as Ezekiel Akpele, Elijah Michael, and Goddard John.
Additionally, NDLEA agents destroyed two cannabis farms spanning over three hectares on the border between Edo and Ondo states, seizing 48kg of processed cannabis during the operation.
