— Sold my property to pay ransom when abducted

By Dayo Johnson, Akure

A 35-year-old suspect, Ayodele Osuya, arrested with 228 Kilograms of substances suspected to be Indian Hemp, by Ondo State Command of the Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), has confessed why he ventured into the illicit business.

In an interview, after he was paraded by the agency in Akure, the suspect said ” my brother, I went into the business to fend for my family.

Osuya said he was kidnapped some time ago and had to sell all he had to pay for the ransom demanded by his captors before they released me. It was a sad experience.

“I’m only trying to help my family. I have nobody to help me. So, that is why I have to get myself involved in this business, to cater for my family.

” I just started this year, because last year, Fulani herdsmen kidnapped me.

” I sold all I had, including my building, my vehicle.

“Because I have nobody that could help me. I had to sell what I have to free myself. I paid for my ransom from the proceed of my property that I sold for me to be freed.

He, however said he was not the owner of the vehicle in which the suspected Indian hemp were discovered.

Earlier, the State Commandant of the NDLEA, Mr Kayode Raji, said his men had been on the suspects trail for a long time.

Raji said that the suspect was arrested with 309 pieces of the Indian hemp weighing 228kg sealed in the booth of a Toyota Camry car.

“We have been on his trail for a very long time and at a time, we also suspected that he was very suspicious and almost about to get wind he was being trailed, so we relaxed the manhunt.

“We employed characters so that our identity will be concealed. But at the end of the day, on March 29, he was nabbed at a place called Quarter guard in Akure, Ondo State.

“And a compressed cannabis, carefully stacked in the booth of the car, about 309 pieces of compressed cannabis, of about 228kg ,” he said.

Raji, appealed to the people of the state to stop the illicit business, noting that “dealing and cultivating cannabis pays nobody, sit is evil and we should all steer clear of it.’

He vowed to combat the “merchant of death frontally in the state, declaring that “it is either you get out of the state or you get out of the business.”