Cooking pots and drums of chemicals were left in an abandoned shed hidden in a Nigerian forest said to be the remnants of a multi-million dollar transnational methamphetamine operation.
Authorities dismantled the crude makeshift meth lab Wednesday after a trial involving three Mexican citizens spent a day at the site last week.
AFP visited the laboratory in the southwestern state of Ogun with officials from the National Narcotics Law Enforcement Agency, who hired local welders and carpenters to dismantle cauldrons and filtration equipment used to make methamphetamine.
In recent years, West Africa has become a transit point for drugs, mostly cocaine, destined for Europe from South America.
But local authorities say the largest-ever seizure of a methamphetamine lab in Nigeria points to the involvement of Mexican cartels in the country. “As for our readiness to fight drug cartels… yes, we are ready,” James Talba, deputy commander for counternarcotics at the National Agency for Drugs and Crime, told AFP.
“We have the ability to reduce the number of people in this situation.”
The laboratory is situated on an acre of land in the forest that straddles the border of the villages of Abidaba and Iroto.
In May, authorities arrested 10 people, including seven Nigerians, and raided the facility and two homes in an upscale Lagos neighborhood, seizing $360 million worth of methamphetamine and chemicals used to make it.
Legal proceedings are still ongoing in courts and chambers in Lagos.
NDLEA forensics director Patricia Afolabi said the court ordered the lab’s dismantling for environmental reasons, citing groundwater and air contamination caused by chemicals used to make the drug.
Barrels of chemicals and semi-finished products were left as evidence in the shed, which were still giving off choking vapors when AFP visited.
– International trafficking, local production –
West Africa’s ports have become popular transit points for cross-continental cocaine shipments to Europe, with some contraband finding its way into domestic drug markets as the region’s cash-strapped health services struggle to cope.
Other substances, such as methamphetamine, can be produced locally.
According to a 2019 Institute for Security Studies report, methamphetamine seizures and lab raids have been increasing in Nigeria since around 2011 as Latin American experts exported expertise to the country.
In June, another Mexican citizen was arrested during a methamphetamine bust in Oyo state.
Local farmer Florence Banjo said the stench from the methamphetamine lab sometimes drifted into her nearby village of Abidaba, about a kilometer away.
Although some farmland is less than 500 meters from the construction site, the laboratory is hidden by the forest.
Banjo thinks the smell is coming from a pig pen, but doesn’t realize it’s coming from a meth lab.
A series of moves and construction around the site initially gave her hope.
“We heard rumors that they were going to build an estate there and I’m happy that they have finally paved the road to our village,” the 59-year-old told AFP.
“We are disappointed.”
TBD/nro/rh
This article was generated from automated news agency feeds without modifications to the text.
