By: ADEKUNLE
YUSUF
In spite of
mammoth arrests, seizures and convictions of drug peddlers, the battle against
illicit drugs is far from being won, as the criminal market continues to grow,
drawing profit and impetus for organised crime. After keeping a close tab on
the agency for more than two years, Assistant Editor ADEKUNLE YUSUF reports
that the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) requires an overhaul if
it is to regain its teeth to fight the drug war.
It was in the wee
hours – a time many residents were still asleep in an upscale housing estate in
Akure, capital of Ondo State. Suddenly, a mild commotion erupted like an angry
volcano, disrupting the tranquil sweetness of the night. In a gestapo-like
manner, officials of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA),
apparently acting on a tip-off, swooped on a secret cannabis warehouse inside
Shagari Housing Estate, spewing a shocking discovery that literally stole
headlines. Many residents – who had their sleep abruptly cut short by the whoop
of invading ‘warriors’ in 12 trucks – were shocked, as NDLEA operatives evacuated
a staggering 34,030kg of cannabis with an estimated street value of N364
million from the criminal stockroom. Starting before the break of the dawn, the
successful raid, which resulted in the single largest seizure of the illicit
drug ever recorded in the state, lasted for more than eight hours that fateful
Thursday, April 9, 2015.
Basking in the
euphoria of the exploits of his officials’ exploits, Ibrahim Abdul, NDLEA
commander in Ondo State, boasted that his men would never rest on their oars
until the state is rid of prohibited drugs. He named two arrested suspects, who
he also paraded: God-day Chibuzor, 27, and Collins Nmor, 35, who are said to be
cooling their heels in an NDLEA holding cell, assisting investigators in
getting to the roots of the criminal network.
“We began
evacuation of the drug since 4 a.m. with 12 vehicles and the operation lasted
over 12 hours. As we speak, three sensitive operations involving the
destruction of cannabis plantation are going on simultaneously,” Abdul said.
But that
commendable feat was not an isolated case, as daily news reports are always
awash with exploits of various states – drug seizures, arrests of suspected
couriers, etc. More often than not, NDLEA officials in the various commands
across the country risk their lives as they cross rivers, walk through valleys
and ascend unwieldy mountains to access cannabis plantations. Because cannabis
farmlands are usually tucked away in the far-flung corners of Nigeria’s vast
forest reserves to escape the eagle eyes of ever-ready anti-narcotic
operatives, their destruction operations are said to be quite cumbersome and
hazardous – with dangers of predatory animals that populate the largely
impenetrable jungles.
That perhaps
explains why NDLEA hardly raises eyebrows anytime the agency boasts that it has
a superlative record in drug supply suppression index – in terms of size of
drug farmlands destroyed, persons arrested and the quantity of drugs seized
from couriers. As a matter of fact, in the last three and a half years, NDLEA
has destroyed unprecedented hectares of cannabis farms and intercepted
kilogrammes of narcotics, including cannabis, psychotropic substances,
ephedrine, heroine, amphetamine, cocaine and methamphetamine. And with a
staggering conviction statistics of 8,637 persons in five years – 1,509 in
2010; 1,491 in 2011; 1,718 in 2012; 1,865 in 2013 and 2,054 in 2014 – it will
be difficult for any doubting Thomas to distrust NDLEA’s scorecard. “NDLEA has
one of the highest criminal conviction scorecards among security agencies in
the country. In line with our prosecution policy, all arrested drug traffickers
are diligently prosecuted. Conviction is a top priority to us because it serves
as a punishment to offenders while it also deters many from indulging in drug trafficking,”
Ahmadu Giade, national chairman of the agency, bragged recently.
Drugs, drugs
everywhere!
As alluring as
the statistics on arrests, seizures and convictions are, they lie about the
drug conundrum afflicting the country. Behind the façade of regular
self-glorification headlines that cannot be tethered to reality is a country
reeling under the pangs of a roaring drug business. From the north to the
south, east to the west, there is proliferation of illegal drugs in all the
dark and dank places in the country, as more and more people are losing their
souls to destructive drugs, ranging from cannabis to heroin and cocaine etc.
Although Nigeria used to be referred to as a drug transit nation, it is now
fast becoming a haven for illicit drug manufacturers and consumers, with
visible effects in major cities such as Kano, Lagos, Kaduna, Maiduguri, Port
Harcourt, Onitsha, Owerri, Ibadan, among others, as people openly consume
cannabis sativa (otherwise known locally as Indian Hemp), which is now commonly
cultivated and consumed publicly in many parts of the country.
Nigerians with
criminal intents regularly walk into the waiting arms of security
operatives in many countries, with many drug barons and couriers alike falling
for the guillotines, especially in nations where peddling in illicit substances
attracts capital sentences.
Last April, the
world was jolted when Indonesia executed eight drug convicts, including four
Nigerians – Jaminu Abashin, 41; Martin Anderson, 50; Okwudili Oyatanze, 41; and
Sylvester Obiekwe, 42. The others were two Australians, one Brazilian and one
Indonesian. Earlier in January, Indonesia also executed two Nigerians for
similar offences, while eleven others are said to be on death row for drug
offences. In China, Malaysia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Singapore and other
countries where drug peddling attracts death verdict, hundreds of Nigerians
have been reportedly executed in the last five years. A staggering number is
said to be awaiting the hangmen for indulging in illegal drug businesses.
Of course, the
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) used to label Nigeria in the
80s and 90s as a mere transit point for heroin and cocaine intended for markets
in Europe, East Asia and North America, among other places. Besides Nigeria,
other West African countries have also become veritable routes for smuggling
large amounts of illicit drugs from South America into Europe and North
America. Sadly, experts are worried lately that the new stark reality is that
Nigeria is fast becoming a production ground for psychotropic substances,
worsened by a drastic increase in the rate of drug abuse among the young
segments of the population, since there is still large availability of these
illicitly manufactured products despite enormous efforts by narcotics
operatives to frustrate the drug market. Topping the chart of most drugs most
abused in the country is cannabis, which is not only consumed massively in
various forms, but is also widely grown distributed in many parts of Nigeria.
Although the NDLEA flayed the report for not being scientific in its method of
arriving at its conclusions, a recent UNODC World report fingered Nigeria as
one of the countries with the highest use of illicit drugs in Africa. The same
report also rated the country high, lauding it for having the highest seizure
of cannabis in Africa.
Operatives
collude with barons, aid couriers
As many
homes are forced to wear the mourning clothes whenever their kith and kin play
into the hands of public executioners in foreign lands, it hardly occurs to
them that it is as a result of institutional failures in the country.
Unknown to many
Nigerians, friends and family relations who get caught abroad for indulging in
criminal acts of drug trafficking are individuals who are at their wit’s end
after the initial dΓ©jΓ vu for beating the security checks in the home country.
Although NDLEA is always quick to deny it, discreet investigations have shown
that it is increasingly common at the agency’s several commands for some bad
eggs to collude with the criminals they are being paid to hunt and bring to
book, giving them access to traffic in illicit drugs for a fee. As if the NDLEA
is primed to be a house of scandals, some of unscrupulous operatives at the
various ports of entry and exit have inculcated the treacherous habit of
working in cahoots with drug criminals, seeking the merchants of death the same
way a salesman looks out for customers to buy his wares because of the love for
filthy lucre.
Even if it is not
a business that is transacted in the open, compromising narcotics control and
policing is prevalent at the nation’s international airports and seat ports
where officers that have been found most worthy by the agency leadership are
expected to be posted. In fact, for every three arrests or seizures, it is
disheartening that no fewer than ten will have been criminally aided to beat
the security apparatus at most of Nigeria’s airports and seaports. Because the
drug barons have evolved into a cartel with huge resources to grease the palms
of willing operatives, the gates are easily flung open for easy passage, with
each smart drug passenger parting with at least N1.5 million. As some corrupt
operatives sometimes look the other way at the country’s entry and exit points
to ensure safe passage for their partners in crime, some of their colleagues
that man the various NDLEA commands in many states are not saints too, for it
is becoming increasingly disturbing for the operatives to connive with
criminals they are being paid to hound.
But this is not
unknown to NDLEA, as a few instances will suffice. In January last year, Ogun
State command of the agency was alleged to be enmeshed in a scandal involving
its commander. For allegedly tampering with exhibit money recovered from a drug
baron in the state, Mohammed M. Mohammed was reportedly queried by the agency.
As one of those in possession of one of the keys to the exhibit room, the
commander allegedly broke into the room of the agency and stole exhibit money
which were retrieved from drug barons and kept in the exhibit room. The amount
he was alleged to have stolen was said to be in six digits. To forestall fraud
and corruption, NDLEA encourages that the keys to the exhibit rooms are
separately kept by three different personnel so that no single officer would
have access to the room at any time. But Mohammed was said to be under intense
financial pressure occasioned by the burial of his deceased mother. He was said
to have needed money desperately and his relief was to break the exhibit room
with his personal carpenter and made away with money recovered from drug barons
in the state. The commander fled to his country home for the burial of
his mother. When the scam was leaked, Mohammed was contacted on phone
concerning the fraud. In order to cover up, he allegedly sourced for funds
immediately and deposited it in the account of another officer, identified as
Saminu Sanni, who withdrew the money at his Abeokuta bank and handed same
to the exhibit keeper, Chuwang Bulus.
Also last year,
specifically in early August, many major national dailies feasted on acts of
malfeasance involving some commanding officers of NDLEA in Ondo State who were
alleged to be providing paid protection for drug barons in the state. When the
dust raised by the scandal in Ondo was yet to settle, news of a bigger show of
shame broke weeks later, as another set of drug cartel was unmasked in the
agency’s command in Kaduna State. At the heart of this scandalous compromise
were Mohammed Kaka Jibrin, the state commander, and Goddy Obainoke, assistant
state commander in charge of operations and intelligence, as well as a coterie
of other senior officers in the command who were alleged to be hobnobbing with
drug barons for monetary gains. While it is widely believed even within the
agency that mindboggling unprofessional practices are entrenched in the
command, sources said luck ran out of these unpatriotic officers following a
disagreement over the sharing of the loot and proceeds from recycled drugs
after parties in the cartel felt cheated by the commander. Besides this, it was
also discovered that the command was entangled in several unwholesome cases
bordering on recycling of seized drugs and extortion of huge sums of money from
arrested drug dealers in exchange for freedom. Scores of cases of arrests with
considerable drug seizures, which were later compromised for huge monetary
returns, were uncovered when the national headquarters of the agency beamed its
searchlight into the scam.
The ugly
discoveries were said to be so overwhelming that Ahmadu Giade, NDLEA
Chairman/Chief Executive, who visited the command immediately, ordered the
immediate detention of Suleiman El-Gandau, Isa Hayatou, Ikumelo Segun, and Alao
Sulaimon Dawodu. He also directed the allegedly compromising commander and his
deputy to hand over to Alabe Azinge Samuel, presumably to restore normalcy in
the command and mitigate the condemnation that the incident might engender.
Sadly for Giade, some of the affected officers were alleged to be some of
his favourites who had enjoyed unmerited special treatment under him.
Another operative
of the NDLEA who specialised in passing drug traffickers at the airport was
arrested for abetting and aiding drug traffickers in June last year. Ibidayin
Godwin, an operative attached to the command in Anambra State, was arrested at
MMIA by fellow NDLEA officials. He allegedly abandoned his duty post in Anambra
and flew to Lagos to pass a drug trafficker who was to use the MMIA to his
destination. He was quickly picked up for allegedly aiding and abetting Adetoye
Taiwo, a suspected drug trafficker, in smuggling 3kg of methamphetamine to
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. But Ibidayin was not alone in the scam, for he
reportedly fingered three others in his clandestine drug cartel: Taiwo Ososanya,
Fatai Olawale Akera and Yusuf Olayemi Bankole. It was learnt some other senior
colleagues were involved.
Benjamin Salihu
Ikani, a lawyer, joined the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) as a
pioneer officer in 1990. Today, he is unhappy. After rising through the ranks
in the Directorate of Prosecution to Assistant Director before he was made
Director of Inspectorate, he was granted leave of absence in 2003, when he was
appointed Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice in Kogi State.
However, upon his
return to the agency in 2005, things started assuming a gruesome dimension for
this officer. His offence: he was made secretary of the Justice Obayan
Presidential Committee for the Reorganisation of NDLEA, which came up with
far-reaching recommendations on how to reposition the agency. Perhaps because
the committee submitted a scathing report about the mindboggling malfeasances
rocking the agency, Ikani was said to have been singled out for reprisal
attacks. After concluding the national assignment, he was promptly transferred
to Ekiti State as Commander, a position lower than that of a Director that he
was before his leave of absence.
Not done yet, he
was transferred to Yobe State as Commander before he was further, once again,
demoted to Assistant Commander in Borno State in 2009, where he has remained
till date after surviving two attempts to ease him out of service prematurely.
Sadly for Ikani, he was last promoted in 2001, with several of his juniors
having left him behind by at least three ranks.
In the same boat
with Ikani is Paul Audu, a chief superintendent of narcotics whose predicament
is a public knowledge. Besides the fact that he was last promoted in 2006, this
officer who is said to be a loyal and hardworking operative was posted to Yobe
State in June 2007 as a prosecutor, and has remained there ever since. Not only
that, he has been stagnated on a rank for almost ten years, with many of his
former juniors now his superiors. It is so bad for him that he now works under
an assistant commander (operations and intelligence) who used to be his junior
officer. His offence: Daring to come up with an operational strategy to rake in
some of the barons, leading to the arrest of Akindele Akimuluyi, an elusive
drug baron, who was later convicted. In his petitions, Audu claimed that he was
in the process of uncovering Akindele’s litany of assets, which would have led
to the arrest of several other barons and dismantling of drug networks when
Giade, fully aware of the efforts, directed that he be posted outside Lagos,
first Adamawa and later Taraba State.
But Ikani and
Audu are not alone. Also in the league of unhappy officers is Anthony Ohanyere,
a lawyer and alumnus of the elite Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies
who is reputed to be one of the doyens of anti-money laundering laws in
Nigeria. Despite his experience, Ohanyere has been stagnated on the same rank
for the last 13 years. He is “languishing” in Enugu State as Commander whereas
those junior to him are now directors at the agency headquarters. So is Wale
Ige, a pioneer officer and holder of a PhD of many years, who is also an
alumnus of the National Institute for Strategic Studies. Not only is this
well-read officer stagnated, he now serves under a far junior officer in
Adamawa State.
The favoured ones
Since Giade took
over the leadership of the agency in 2005, tongues have never stopped wagging
about his style of leadership. Many serving officers have alleged in their
various petitions to the Presidency and the National Assembly that he thrives
on sentiments. It is alleged that some operatives from a section of the country
are being recycled within ‘juicy’ commands of their choice, while others not so
favoured are stagnated in far-flung places.
For example,
there is a long-standing general practice in the NDLEA, which encourages
constant redeployment of officers after four years in a command, be it juicy or
dry. The aim is to ensure safety of operatives, among other things. However,
this has been observed in the breach over the last ten years under Giade. That
is why it is possible for Hamza Umar from Katsina State, an officer recruited
into the agency in 1993, to remain as commander for seven years at Muritala
Mohammed International Airport (MMIA), which is regarded as one of the busiest
gateways for drug trafficking into and from Nigeria. Despite having several
other officers senior to him, especially those who joined the agency in 1990,
Umar still calls the shots at MMIA.
He is not alone
in the league of beneficiaries of Giade’s alleged favouritism. Hamise Lawan,
commander at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja, is also from
the North and has been there for eight years. Petitioners also complain that
other cronies of Giade are recycled around Tin Can Island, Apapa Sea Ports,
Kano and Enugu airports. Among the directors in the agency, there is one called
Hussein Baba from Kebbi State, who has been director for the past ten years
under Giade. He was said to have performed shamefully as director of
Investigation and Operations, but he is redeployed as director in charge of
Drug Demand Reduction unit where has been for the past three years without any
meaningful impact on the agency and the war on narcotics.
Unfortunately,
like Baba, none of the officers that are alleged to be in Giade’s good book is
known for any spectacular or extraordinary service delivery that is deserving
of preferential treatment being meted out to them.
Although the
NDLEA boss, in the exercise of his powers, may reward exceptional hard work,
devotion to duty and honesty by promotion, but this power is not without
limitations. Under Giade, some officers alleged that this power has been
confused with the unrestrained powers to award special promotion in addition to
promotion to higher rank at the same time – which is seen as a blatant
overkill. It is alleged further that not fewer than ninety percent of the
beneficiaries of Giade’s special promotions are individuals who have done
nothing special at all. That is why some officers are taunting the special
promotions showered on Hamza Umar, Ahmed Suleiman Ningi, Sunday Drambi
Zirangey, Okafor Olisaemeka, Usman Ali Wadar, Aweda Mathew, Osifuye Femi
Johnson, Grace Badung, among others, which catapulted them over three grade
levels in four years.
As one unhappy
senior officer asked, why will an “officer with a doctorate degree and a
product of the National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies be pegged on
GL 14 for well over ten years while officers with first degree and have barely
spent three years on GL 14 have been promoted to GL 16 by Giade’s special
promotion?” As things stand, some allege that over 95 per cent of the officers
on GL15 and GL16, as contained in Giade’s last promotion exercise, are
manifestly junior to a good number of officers on GL14 who have been on this
level since January 2000, 2001 and 2002, while most of the officers on Grade
Level 15 and 16 now were barely due for promotion between 2004, 2005 and now.
Those that are long due for promotion but still stagnated on GL14 for no fault
of theirs are now being made to report to and carry out orders and instructions
from those who are ordinarily their junior. This is breeding discontent in the
agency, with an avalanche of petitions before the Presidency.
Another issue
which gets some mention in many of the petitions on the agency centres around
how men who are supposed to ensure drug couriers and barons get maximum
punishment now conspire to help them escape with light sentences.
165kg cocaine
hidden in tiles seized at Tincan Port
In this concluding
part of the series on the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA),
Assistant Editor ADEKUNLE YUSUF, who has watched the agency for more than two
years, examines how light sentences, poor funding and others have contributed
to robbing operatives of the teeth to properly bite drug barons and couriers
In February, last
year, Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court, Lagos, was livid with
rage. Reason: men who are supposed to ensure drug couriers and barons get
maximum punishment now conspire to help them escape with light sentences.
The judge
openly accused Abu Mohammed, an NDLEA prosecutor, of conspiring with the
defence lawyer, Benson Ndakara, to frustrate a drug case. The accused in
the matter, Emmanuel Obiora, was eventually sentenced to five years
imprisonment for importing 8.270kg of cocaine from Pakistan and for offering
same for sale in Nigeria.
A furious
Justice Abang indicted both Mohammed and Ndakara of conspiring to conceal vital
evidence to help the convict to escape justice. While delivering his judgment,
the judge said his court would never be part of such unwholesome conduct. He
then convicted and sentenced Obiora to five years imprisonment for dealing in
prohibited drugs and concealing the genuine origin of the N14 million proceeds
of the alleged crime, ordering that the five-year jail terms for each of the
four counts should run concurrently. He also ordered that the N14 million
proceeds of the crime be forfeited to the government.
The judge, who
relied on circumstantial evidence to convict Obiora, accused both the
prosecuting and defence lawyers of colluding to help the convict to escape
justice by withholding vital evidence in the case.
According to
Abang, the prosecuting counsel “for the reason best known to him” refused to tender
the full voluntary statement in which the convict was said to have confessed to
the crime, adding that: “The written address filed by the learned prosecuting
counsel was of no help to the court. If I order investigation into this matter,
heads will roll.”
He said in
addition to the refusal of the prosecuting counsel to tender the full statement
of the accused, the lawyer also refused to corroborate the evidence of the
fifth prosecution witness, Idris Zakari. According to him, Zakari had testified
that the convict confessed to him and also wrote a statement to that effect on
June 29, 2009, the day after he was arrested.
“Learned counsel
for the prosecution kept mute in his written address that the accused made a
confessional statement. Whose interest is the learned counsel for the
prosecution serving? Is he serving the interest of the prosecution, or justice?
Or is he serving the interest of the accused person to escape justice? The
attitude of the learned counsel for the prosecution is most unfair to the court
and to the administration of criminal justice system,” he said.
He was also
bitter that Ndakara, also in his written address, pretended as if his client
had not confessed to the crime.
The judge said:
“Is it that the learned counsel for the prosecution and the learned counsel for
the accused colluded to frustrate justice? Is it that they colluded so that the
accused can go away to enjoy the N14 million which he illegally procured? With
regard to the unchallenged evidence of PW5 and the evidence contained in
Exhibit E1 (a portion of the accused person’s statement tendered by the
prosecution), it is my humble view that the accused person conspired with Sam
Egunibe to import 8.270kg of cocaine from Pakistan to Nigeria.”
The judge’s anger
makes more sense when put in a wider context. For the records, part II (fourth
schedule) of NDLEA Act, which specifies offences and punishments, says anyone
who “imports, manufactures, produces, processes, plants or grows the drugs popularly
known as cocaine, LSD, heroin or any other similar drugs shall be guilty of an
offence and liable on conviction to be sentenced to an imprisonment for life.”
The same
imprisonment term applies if anyone “exports, transports or otherwise traffics
in the drugs otherwise known as cocaine, LSD, heroin or any other similar
drugs”.
A life sentence
equally awaits any suspect who”sells, buys, exposes or offers for sale or
otherwise deals in or with drugs popularly known as cocaine, LSD, heroin or any
other similar drugs.”
It is only those
who knowingly possess or use the drugs mentioned earlier by smoking, inhaling
or injecting that are liable on conviction to an imprisonment term not less
than 15 years but not exceeding 25 years. However, as shown in Obiora’s case,
most of the convictions secured by NDLEA hardly follow stipulated punishments.
This is possible
because some prosecutors do help the accused to doctor confessional statements
for a fee. If a deal is struck, an incriminating statement can be swapped for a
less indicting one, ranging from N200,000 to N300,000, depending on the weight
of the issues involved and desperation exhibited by the defence team. It is
said to be a cartel existing within the NDLEA, courts and the prison system.
That is what made it possible for 197 convicts to refuse to serve their jail
terms – 101 in 2005 and 96 in 2006 (see tables on convicts that evaded jail
terms). Justice Gilbert Obayan panel report, which detailed how the cartel
works and suggested how the agency can be reformed, was frustrated by the same
cartel. The report was submitted to the government in 2007, leaving it to
gather dust while the agency stinks in malfeasance. Giade, in a
past interview with this newspaper, said events had overtaken the report.
Of 123 convictions
NDLEA secured at the Federal High Court Lagos in 2014, made up of 117 men and 9
women, sentences ranged from one day to 15 years for various drug offences.
Justice Musa Kurya sentenced a pregnant woman, Kudirat Bello, to one day
imprisonment for possessing 33.3kg of cannabis, while 38-year-old Obinna Okeke
was sentenced to 15 years with hard labour by Justice M. D. Idris for
possession of 3kg of cannabis. Lanre Salami, who was arrested at Oshodi, lied
to the court that he was 15 years old. The court later discovered that he was
actually 17 years old. He was sentenced to 10 years for unlawful dealing in 400
grammes of cannabis. Salisu Usman, 42, was apprehended at Iddo Motor Park on
his way to Zamfara, his home State with 47kg of diazepam. He was sentenced to 5
years imprisonment with hard labour.
Besides the
evil of light sentences, there are ways that NDLEA operatives have devised to
make life easy for drug suspects by helping them to get away with their heinous
crimes. It is a cartel that operates within the agency and the courts,
sometimes involving the prisons. It works using the power of bribe, blackmail
and barefaced threats.
In 2012, it
became so irritating at a point that Justice Ibrahim Buba of the Federal High
Court, Lagos, had to voice out his frustration. The learned judge was incensed
that hundreds of accused drug criminals granted bail on liberal terms had
jumped bail, a situation that cut across several other courts. The judge,
clearly frustrated with the situation, scolded the NDLEA in court, sometimes
having to issue several orders to the agency to re-arrest suspects.
One tactics is to
advise drug dealers to contract special defence lawyers, since big names among
lawyers know the judges who are favourable and those that are tough, using some
court officials to manipulate and make sure that their client’s case is
assigned to a court that can play ball. That is why some judges grant bail to
the suspects on liberal terms, with the stipulation that the NDLEA must verify
the sureties.
Yet the job of
verifying sureties is done by the same set of people who will endorse any
arrangement made by the defence lawyers – all done within the NDLEA. Unknown to
the unsuspecting public, this seemingly harmless arrangement facilitates drug
business in country. Having realised that Justice Buba’s no-nonsense stance is
frustrating their unholy deals, drug suspects do everything they can to avoid
his court.
Poor funding,
logistics undermine operations
For a federal
agency that is saddled with a mandate that touches on overall national security
and public health, it is the shame of a nation that NDLEA is lacking in
operational tools, logistics and equipment to discharge its functions
effectively and efficiently. In most of its commands, the agency does not have operational
vehicles, with only lucky commands that get the state governments to donate one
or two vehicles to cover several local government areas. And if it is
unacceptable that many state commands of this all-important national agency
exist only in names, the zonal commands do not fare any better. As a matter of
fact, only fortunate state commands occupy unfurnished edifices left behind by
the defunct Social Democratic Party or National Republican Party, built during
the ill-fated transition programme of Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida regime. Not
only is it regrettable that the agency that was established over twenty years
ago still remains ad hoc without any permanent structure at any of its state
commands, the national headquarters of the agency in Lagos is sheltered in a
place abandoned by the Nigeria Intelligence Agency (NIA). Other sister
paramilitary agencies established around the same time or even after NDLEA have
since put up permanent office headquarters in Abuja.
But the problems
go beyond lack of suitable office and residential accommodation, a luxury
enjoyed by other paramilitary agencies in the country. For a fact, NDLEA, an
agency that is expected to police and apprehend moneyed criminals, cannot
afford official vehicles for most of its state commanders, who are equivalent
of Commissioners of Police. What that means is that any state commander who
cannot afford a personal car has to go on official duties on motorcycles, or
find other avenues to make ends meet. Some senior officers also told The Nation
that the agency denies them of common logistics such as chemicals to fumigate
cannabis plantations whenever they embark on destruction operations of cannabis
farmlands in densely packed forests. That is why it is not uncommon for NDLEA
operatives to carry ordinary cutlasses and walk several kilometers in the
forests to locate illegal farms, as most activities in the agency are being
done manually in today’s increasingly modern world. It is also lacking life
jackets, helmets, hand and leg cuffs, as well as firearms superior to the ones
being used by barons – thus exposing the operatives to dangers that regularly
claim their lives.
Also, at the
state commands, operations are hamstrung by paucity of funds, forcing some
state commanders to depend on handouts from all sources. According to some
state commanders, what goes to each state command on a monthly basis is in the
neighbourhood of N100, 000.00 (one hundred thousand naira) for the running of
the entire command, which is said to be irregular. From this meager imprest,
vehicles, buildings and other operational activities are maintained, including
fuelling of vehicles and generators. And to make matters worse, some senior
officers confided in The Nation that any state commander that wants to remain
in the good book of Giade must make substantial returns on arrests, drug
seizures and prosecution, failing which the commander is punished with either
removal or being sidelined or both. Ofoyeju vehemently denied this allegation
against his boss, saying incorruptibility is one of Giade’s selling points.
But the
management may not be directly responsible for the dearth of fund crisis that
has been hitting the agency over the years. As if Nigeria is oblivious of the
national security and public health implications of the war against illicit
drugs, it hardly provides enough capital to prosecute the gargantuan
responsibility of drug policing and control, putting severe pressure on
operational and capital projects in the agency.
“Funding of the
agency, especially for operations and capital projects, has not been
encouraging over the years and indeed a far cry from what the agency requires
to carry its functions effectively and efficiently, as well as to sustain its
modest achievements. With the perpetual dearth of funds, the management of the
agency continually contends with serious challenges of prompt payment of
expenses incurred by the personnel for official assignments. The continued
accumulation of these claims has remained one of the most serious challenges to
the agency’s operations,” said the 2014 NDLEA Annual Report.
In more specific
terms, with a staff strength of 5,150 in 2013, NDLEA was given a paltry
N65,608,787 as capital expenditure, N536,293,912 as overhead cost and
N6,067,598,587 as personnel cost to run its 49 formations across the country.
But a worse financial quagmire handcuffed the agency in 2014, for out of
N562,483,887 appropriated for NDLEA’s day-to-day operational activities, only
67.11 per cent was released. That same year, out of N183,399,762 appropriated
for capital projects, a mere 37.8 per cent was released, thus crashing
expectations on several contracts awarded that could not be backed with cash.
In fact, it was so bad that by the time government was constrained to give
N1billion lifeline called intervention fund to the agency in 2014, the chunk of
it was gulped by payment of accumulated burial expenses for deceased officers,
duty tour allowances, medical allowances for officers, and other staff claims.
Even in 2012, funding for the agency did not fare any better. It took
N100,000,000 for capital expenditure, N630,228503 for overhead cost, and
8,880,969,451 for personnel cost; just as it was given N61,282,731 for capital
expenditure, N633,008,502 for overhead cost and 7,096,260,039 for personnel
cost in 2011. By the 2010 when the agency’s overall staff strength was 3,332,
it received N361,058,277 for capital expenses, N523,300,000 for overhead cost,
and N5,828,168,363 for personnel cost. And with a workforce of 3,405 in 2009,
NDLEA got N160,000,000 for capital expenses, N343,000,000 as
overhead cost and N4,117,358,361 as personnel cost. As one officer put it last
week, the agency is not the only loser; it is the war on narcotics whose
proliferation is killing the country.
One drug agent to
over 30,000 Nigerians
Unless more hands
are urgently engaged, it is sheer mirage to expect wonders from NDLEA as it is
currently staffed and constituted. Perhaps as a result of lack of foresight on
the part of successive leadership of the agency, the war against illicit drug
has been hampered by grossly inadequate manpower, which is not unknown to those
at its helm of affairs. With a staff strength of slightly over 5,000, NDLEA is
left with the precariousness of one drug agent to more than 34,000 Nigerians (using
173million estimate). According Femi Ajayi, former NDLEA DG, the agency needs
at least 15,000 more hands to be able to do its work effectively.
Unfortunately,
the last time the agency recruited about 2,000 people four years ago, it was
allegedly mired in fraud. Each of 450,000 unemployed Nigerians was made to pay
N1,500, amounting to N675,000,000 to write the test. However, by the time
recruitment was carried out, most of the lucky applicants were chosen without
any recourse to merit or federal character principle. In a memo sent to the
Senate committee on narcotics in February 2013, it was alleged that more than
20 per cent of those given the job did not apply at all, with more successful
candidates from Bauchi where Giade hails from. For upward of three years, NDLEA
deploy these recruits without training and arm them, blaming it on lack of
fund. The petitioners asked, “Why were they not trained with the huge money
expropriated from the over 450,000 applicants? How much does Ahmadu Giade
actually need to train these men? What has he done with the over half a Billion
naira that he made? Where is it? Did he pay the money into the federation
account or such similar account of government? Is the Federal Government now
taxing unemployed youths of Nigeria rather than give them job?”
One agency, two
political appointees
For inexplicable
reasons, the law setting up the agency has saddled it with a multiplicity of
albatross right from inception. By its structure, the National Chairman of
NDLEA is the Chief Executive and also Chairman of its board – an anomaly which
insiders say has been breeding mediocrity, ineptitude, high-handedness, lack of
respect for rules and regulations and absence of transparency in the agency
over the years. In essence, the NDLEA Chief Executive who directs affairs is
also the one who supervises the activities of the agency. As one senior officer
recently mocked the agency, not only does every holder of the office run the
place like his personal fiefdom, sycophancy walks on all fours in the agency,
prompting serving officers to continue to write petitions against the
leadership after the system has failed to address their grievances adequately.
That is just a
tip of the iceberg. Unlike all other paramilitary organizations in the country,
NDLEA is piloted by two political appointees – a queer arrangement that is
money-guzzling. Apart from Chairman/Chief Executive who exercises executive
powers, the government is also empowered to appoint somebody as Director
General who is expected to head the secretariat where there is none. Yet NDLEA,
as an organisation, has its own senior officer who is a Director in charge of
Administrations. What this means is that public fund is expended on two
political appointees in one agency, since both the Chairman who is the chief
accounting officer of the agency and the Director General who heads a
nonexistent secretariat are on consolidated salaries. Even in the Nigerian Army
where there is an Army secretary, it is an Army officer who is appointed, not a
political appointee from outside. “Whenever any DG comes, he or she usually
keeps quiet and makes his or her money because they are outsiders who know
nothing about the agency. How can you be paying two political appointees in one
agency? It is wrong? The law was badly drafted to squander public resources,
which currently realities can hardly accommodate. Scrap either the office of DG
or Chief executive and stick with one as it is done in all other paramilitary
organisations in the country. The head of the place is supposed to be a DG or
Narcotics General of NDLEA, being an enforcement agency. If you appoint
from within, the person will certainly be desirous of leaving a legacy, unlike
outsiders who just come in after retiring from their original callings,” one
senior officer said.
Is NDLEA jinxed
with leadership?
On July 16, when
it was announced that all the boards of federal parastatals and agencies had
been dissolved, some top NDLEA officers told The Nation that they were
instantly locked in an upbeat mood. In their estimation, the dissolution
directive would sweep Giade, who they see as the biggest problem from the seat
he has occupied since November 2005. Since the retired deputy commissioner of
police is both the Chief Executive of NDLEA and board Chairman, the disbanding
of the board would terminate his 10-year reign, they reasoned. They were dead
wrong, as these aggrieved officers were shocked to their marrow when Giade
resumed his seat the following day, having been advised that he was not
affected by the presidential directive, being the Chief Executive of the
agency.
Although Giade’s
seat is spared by the recent presidential order, his adversaries believe that
he may not be lucky to wriggle out of an ongoing suit seeking to sack him from
the plum job. At the moment, Giade is embroiled in a legal tussle at the
National Industrial Court in Abuja over an alleged “tenure fraud.” In a suit
filed by Emmanuel Maji, a lawyer in Festus Keyamo Chambers, Giade, who has had
four Directors-General of the Agency – Dave Ashang, Lanre Ipinmisho, Femi Ajayi
and Roli Bode George – serve out their tenure under him, is accused of
remaining in office even though his tenure had expired on November 24, 2009. In
an affidavit sworn to support the originating summons, Maji avowed that the
NDLEA’s boss continued stay in office without any evidence of renewal of tenure
is only a “local and unlawful arrangement” between him and the then Attorney
General and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke. The plaintiff wanted the court
to among others, direct that Giade be replaced by appointing a new person,
while also praying for an order of perpetual injunction restraining the NDLEA
boss from “further parading and conducting himself as NDLEA Chairman forthwith;
an order compelling him to vacate office having exhausted his tenure, and an
order compelling him to refund all his earnings since November 24, 2013 when
attained eight years in office.” He equally wanted the court to declare
unlawful all duties or acts he has performed after November 24, 2013 when his
tenure (if he was reappointed) ought to lapse. The case is yet to be decided.
Whichever way the
pendulum swings, it is obvious the agency is in dire need of a total
reorganisation as well as new direction. And whenever that is going to happen,
some senior NDLEA officers insist that it will do the agency a lot of good if
the person is recruited from within. This, they added, will help correct an
anomaly of “trial and error’ that is often the case in the first one year or
more anytime an outsider is foisted on the agency.
“When outsiders
come and fail, the public usually heaps the blame on the agency and we the
officers,” lamented one officer.
But he may not be
far from the truth. A survey of the history of NDLEA leadership in the last
twenty-five years shows that only the late Musa Bamaiyi (1994-1998) was chosen
from the army, while Bello Lafiaji (2000-2005) was tipped to head the agency
based on his background in the state security service. All other past chairmen
of the agency – Fidelis Oyakhilome (1990-1991), Fulani Kwajafa (1991-1993),
Bappah Jama’re (1993-1994), Ogbonnaya Onovo (1998-2000), Illya Lokadang (2000)
– emerged from the police, including the incumbent Giade (since 2005), who was
picked from retirement after serving the police for 37 years. Citing the
example of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), which was a
ragtag group of volunteers until 2003, top NDLEA operatives said NSCDC has left
NDLEA behind because the paramilitary force started on a good note by
recruiting its first Commandant General from within. After twenty-five
years, not a few believe that NDLEA is ripe for leadership under a career
officer with evidence of sound experience in drug control and integrity track
record that is backed with capacity and depth of knowledge.
But for NDLEA
spokesperson Mitchell Ofoyeju, Giade is the best thing that has ever happened
to the agency. He dismissed all the allegations against him, adding that
the chairman had done all possible to deal with corruption.
As shown clearly
in his interview published in the first two parts of the series, Ofoyeju
believes that “if you conduct an opinion poll among officers, you will
appreciate the fact that those writing (petitions) are either non-existent or
at best insignificant. Let me say this, nobody that loves the country will
write against this leadership.”
