By Daniel Eteghe

LAGOS—National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA, said, yesterday, it had invited the entire crew on Arik Air flight W3101 that left the country for London’s Heathrow Airport for questioning.

The panel of investigation, headed by NDLEA Chairman, Alhaji Ahmadu Giade, was set up to question the pilot and entire crew members on board the flight from Lagos to London, Monday.

Vanguard also gathered from a reliable source that other security agencies such as Department of State Services, DSS, are involved in the investigation of the airline’s processes and operations that left lapses for crew members to allegedly smuggle drugs aboard and abroad.

When contacted to give an update of the investigation, Head, Public Affairs of NDLEA, Mr. Ofoyeju Mitchell, said the agency was working tirelessly to get to the root of the matter.

He said it was NDLEA’s Joint Task Force that was actually coordinating the investigation into the arrest, adding that the agency would not want to pre-empt investigation into the matter.

He said the agency would give full update of what had happened so far with the questioning of the entire crew members as well as the investigation conducted by the agency’s men in the field today.

Ofoyeju said: “We do not want to pre-empt investigation. But as you know, we need to update people and that is why I said we invited the entire crew members of Arik Air, including the pilots, for questioning.

“As we speak, our men are on the field working tirelessly so we do not want anything that will disturb them, that is why we are giving out this information in bits. Tomorrow (today) we will give a detailed information of our findings and follow-ups.”

Asked if the agency had sanctioned Arik Air, he said: “So far, we have not sanctioned them. We are still investigating the matter. For instance, if we are looking for a mason and they say, it is in Isaac Jones Street, we have to go there.

“So for now, our men are seriously working in the field. Just give us tomorrow (today), we will give you details of what we have done.”

It will be recalled that one of Arik Air’s crew members was arrested on Monday at Heathrow Airport, London, for smuggling cocaine.

A similar arrest of the airline’s crew members occurred two years ago and also in 2011.

In December 2011, a 29 years old Arik Air cabin crew, Ms. Chiwendu Uwakonyenma, was arrested in London for drug trafficking. She was jailed five years in 2012.

Also, in 2013, two staff of the airline were arrested also at Heathrow Airport for suspected drug trafficking.