By Priye Briggs
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested two grandfathers, aged 84 and 75, for allegedly selling illicit drugs to teenage secondary school students in Umuahia, Abia State capital.
NDLEA’s Director of Media and Advocacy, Femi Babafemi, disclosed this on Sunday in Abuja.
Babafemi said operatives arrested the first suspect based on credible intelligence that he was selling illicit substances to young students and others through his patent medicine store at 4 Club Road, Umuahia.
A search of the premises yielded 4.64kg of opioids, including tramadol and diazepam.
The second suspect, a 75-year-old pensioner, was apprehended by security guards at St. Silas Secondary School, Old Umuahia, while allegedly supplying drugs to two teenage students whose names were withheld.
“In his statement, one of the students, a 15-year-old SS2 pupil, claimed the 84-year-old grandfather supplied him with drugs which he used and also sold to fellow students,” Babafemi said.
He added that the grandfathers will face prosecution, while the students have been placed on counselling and rehabilitation.
In recent months, NDLEA has recorded a disturbing rise in senior citizens’ involvement in drug peddling targeting young Nigerians, mostly students.
Last month, operatives arrested 75-year-old Okebe Samuel in Ebonyi State with 300g of packaged skunk.
Earlier in Aba, Abia’s commercial hub, 83-year-old shoemaker Pa John Ofiel was caught with 700g of skunk.
In April, 78-year-old Ogunjobi Samuel was picked up during an anti-narcotic operation in Ilupeju-Ekiti.
Some analysts say criminal gangs now recruit the elderly strategically to evade suspicion, given their status as moral pillars of society.
Others attribute it to financial desperation among those who should ordinarily be custodians of moral values.
Regardless of the motive, the NDLEA insists that drug trafficking remains a huge threat to society, particularly for young people whose futures are being destroyed by drug and substance abuse.