A 38-year-old South African woman, Will Ann, has been arrested by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, for allegedly attempting to smuggle 5.75 kilograms of heroin into Nigeria while travelling with her three-year-old son.

The agency said Ann was arrested on Monday, July 6,2026, during the inward clearance of passengers on Qatar Airways Flight QR1433 from Doha.

According to the NDLEA, the suspect allegedly hid 14 large blocks of heroin in two suitcases but initially denied travelling with any checked-in luggage.

In a statement issued on Sunday by the agency’s Director of Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, the anti-narcotics agency said its operatives later confirmed that the baggage tags matched the claim tags attached to the suspect’s passport, forcing her to admit ownership of the bags.

The statement read, “Though she initially denied travelling with check-in bags, after operatives were able to quickly establish that the two bags containing the drugs had tags which tallied with the claim tags attached to her passport, she recanted and admitted ownership of the bags, adding that she forgot she checked in the two bags.”

The agency said the suspect claimed she travelled from Cambodia through Doha to Abuja.

NDLEA further alleged that intelligence showed Ann was part of a transnational drug trafficking organisation operating along the Cambodia-South Africa axis with her husband and partner, Jan Coenraad De Jager.

In another operation, NDLEA operatives at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, arrested a 48-year-old commercial motorcycle rider, Onyechere Chinadu, after he arrived from Madagascar through Addis Ababa on an Ethiopian Airlines flight.

The agency said a search of Chinadu’s backpack led to the discovery of 87 wraps of methamphetamine concealed in clothing.

According to the statement, the suspect confessed that he had worked as an okada rider in Lagos for 15 years before he was recruited into drug trafficking by a Uganda-based associate.

“He said he ingested the recovered pellets of methamphetamine in Uganda before embarking on his planned journey to Madagascar to deliver the drug consignment,” the statement said.

NDLEA added that after the suspect was denied entry into Madagascar, his sponsor allegedly rerouted him to Lagos, where he was arrested.

The agency said Chinadu was placed under observation because he could not state the exact number of pellets he had swallowed.

Between his arrest and July 11, the suspect excreted 13 additional pellets, bringing the total recovery to100 wraps of methamphetamine weighing1.715 kilograms.

At the Apapa Seaport in Lagos, NDLEA said it intercepted 8,287 bags of Canadian Loud, a synthetic cannabis strain, weighing 4,143.5 kilograms and with an estimated street value of more than N10.3 billion.

The agency said the drugs were discovered during a joint examination involving NDLEA officers, the Nigeria Customs Service and other security agencies after weeks of surveillance on the container imported from Canada.

“The discovery followed weeks of targeted tracking and monitoring of the shipment since its departure from Montreal, Canada, by operatives of the Maritime Intelligence Unit of NDLEA in close collaboration with the Apapa Strategic Command of the Agency,” the statement added.

The agency also said its operatives foiled an attempt to export2.5 kilograms of skunk concealed in a gas compressor destined for Cyprus through a Lagos courier company.

Beyond enforcement operations, NDLEA said its commands across the country continued the War Against Drug Abuse sensitisation campaign with advocacy lectures in secondary schools in Ebonyi, Kano, Ekiti and Ogun states.

The agency added that the leadership of its Zone 14 Command also paid an advocacy visit to the Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara.

Commending the officers involved in the operations, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of NDLEA, retired Brig. Gen. Buba Marwa, praised the commands for combining drug supply reduction efforts with public sensitisation.

Marwa also charged officers across the country “not to rest on their past laurels” in the agency’s campaign against illicit drug trafficking and abuse.