A 59-year-old businessman, Chijioke Nnanna Igbokwe, narrowly escaped death after undergoing emergency surgery to remove 81 wraps of cocaine lodged in his stomach. The operation, known as an exploratory laparotomy, became necessary after he failed to excrete the drugs for seven days following his ingestion of the illegal substances in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Igbokwe was arrested by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) in Lagos during the inward clearance of passengers on an Ethiopian Airlines flight on Sunday, January 26, 2025.
A body scan conducted by NDLEA officers detected foreign substances in his stomach, leading to his immediate detention for excretion observation.
An investigation revealed that Igbokwe, who claims to be a clothing trader at Arena Market in Oshodi, Lagos, had traveled to Addis Ababa from Lagos on January 22. The following day, January 23, he ingested the 81 wraps of cocaine before boarding a flight to Beirut, Lebanon, where he intended to deliver the drugs for a payment of $3,000.
However, upon his arrival in Beirut, immigration authorities denied him entry because he had less than the required $2,000. He was subsequently deported back to Addis Ababa, where he attempted to expel the drugs but was unsuccessful. Left with no other option, he boarded a flight to Lagos on January 25 with the substances still inside his body.
Upon his arrival at Lagos airport on January 26, NDLEA officials arrested him. He was placed under observation, but after five days, he had only excreted 24 out of the 81 wraps, despite medical intervention at both NDLEA’s medical facility and the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH).
With time running out and his condition worsening due to underlying medical complications, doctors opted for surgery. On January 30, after his wife and brother signed the necessary consent forms, he was admitted to a tertiary hospital where the remaining 57 wraps of cocaine were surgically removed.
In total, the authorities recovered 81 wraps of the illicit substance, weighing 1.943 kilograms, from his system.
