Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) have arrested ex-Nigerian international footballer, Segun Hunkarin, for alleged cocaine smuggling.
Hunkarin and his associate, Ntoruka Chinedu, were apprehended on Tuesday, June 24, 2025, while attempting to smuggle cocaine into Nigeria through the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Ikeja, Lagos.
Chinedu, a regular traveler known for shipping clothes from Turkey to Nigeria and food items from Nigeria to Turkey, was the first to be caught.
A search of his carry-on bag reportedly uncovered 37 wraps of cocaine, weighing 800 grams, hidden inside.
According to the NDLEA’s Director of Media & Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, investigations revealed that Chinedu arrived from Turkey aboard an Ethiopian Airlines flight, transiting through Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where he picked up the package from another courier before heading to Nigeria.
Further investigation led to the discovery that Hunkarin was waiting in the airport car park to collect the drugs.
Hunkarin, who previously lived in Brazil while playing for football clubs, was tracked and arrested at the car park.
In his statement, Segun Hunkarin confessed that “while playing professional football in Brazil, he had trafficked drugs twice from Brazil to Ethiopia but had never brought any into Nigeria.”
On the same day, NDLEA officers at the Seme border, Badagry, Lagos State, arrested 26-year-old Beninese national, Jean-Luck, for attempting to smuggle 69 balls of skunk—a potent strain of cannabis—into Nigeria from the Benin Republic. The seized consignment weighed 29.5 kilograms.
In a separate operation in Warri, Delta State, NDLEA operatives arrested 72-year-old Mrs. Christy Ejaro at the Niger CAT area for allegedly selling sachets of skunk packaged in retail sizes.
Similarly, on Wednesday, June 25, NDLEA officers raided the base of a notorious drug dealer in Kwara State, identified as Mary Oladele, also known as “Iya Nafi,” located in Omu-Aran, Irepodun Local Government Area.
Various quantities of skunk, tramadol, and flunitrazepam were recovered from her residence.
On Friday, June 27, Europe-based businessman, Amen Okoro Godstime, was arrested at Lagos Airport for allegedly attempting to smuggle 5,000 pills of tramadol 225mg disguised as malaria medications like Lonart, Amatem, and Aluktem.
He was intercepted at the departure hall of Terminal 2 while preparing to board a Royal Air Maroc flight to Spain via Casablanca.
Okoro, who works in freight and logistics between Europe and Nigeria, reportedly told officers that he “planned to transit to France by train before moving the tramadol consignment into Italy for retail distribution.”
That same day, at Akanu Ibiam International Airport (AIIA) in Enugu, NDLEA operatives intercepted Ezenwaka Emmanuel, a bar attendant based in Maputo, Mozambique.
A search of his luggage uncovered 17 cardboard-sized parcels of methamphetamine weighing 17.5 kilograms and three parcels of cocaine weighing 3.05 kilograms.
Another passenger on the same flight, 54-year-old Azu Kpodar, was also intercepted.
During a search of his luggage, operatives found a plastic liquid soap container labeled YPE, which forensic analysis later confirmed contained 1.25 kilograms of liquid cocaine.
Kpodar, a toy seller based in Brinquedo, Sao Paulo, Brazil, claimed that “he purchased the substance while shopping for his wedding ceremony in Nigeria.”
Commending the officers of MMIA, AIIA, Delta, Kwara, and Seme Commands, NDLEA Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Rtd), reaffirmed the agency’s determination to continue its crackdown on drug cartels.