NDLEA arrests ‘Indian-bound businessman’ with heroin at Lagos airport

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested Kingsley Celestino, a businessman, for concealing 9.40 kilograms of heroin in false bottoms of his travelling bags in Lagos.

In a statement on Sunday, Femi Babafemi, NDLEA spokesperson, said Kingsley was arrested at terminal 2 of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Ikeja, on Saturday, on his way to India.

Babafemi said the suspect, a native of Nnewi south LGA of Anambra state, was travelling with a Guinean international passport.

He said preliminary investigation revealed that Celestino frequently travelled to India on business class tickets.

Babafemi said the suspect claimed that he deals in the clothing business between Nigeria and India.

“It was further established that he obtained the Guinean international passport in Guinea Bissau, where he said his mother came from,” Babafemi said.

The NDLEA spokesperson said operatives of the agency at the Tincan seaport, on Friday, recovered 244 parcels of Canadian Loud weighing 79 kilograms.

He said the illicit drugs were concealed in medium-sized wooden sound system speakers packed inside two out of four used vehicles in a container coming from Toronto via Montreal, Canada.

“The imported vehicles used as cover for the drugs are a 2009 Jeep Wrangler and a 2009 Honda Ridgeline,” Babafemi said.

He said one Etounu Monday, another suspect travelling to Oman, was intercepted at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport Abuja, on February 27.

Babafemi said Monday was arrested during the outward clearance of an Ethiopian Airline flight ET 950 while attempting to export 1.924kg of skunk concealed in cream tubes.