Strong indications emerged on Wednesday evening that drug trafficking through the Nigeria Airports, may be difficult to detect as the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, said on Wednesday that many of the scanners at the Nigerian Airports were not functioning.
Her disclosure came just as the Airports Chief of Security, El- Yakub Usman Lamir, said the scanners were not configured for drug detection.
They made the revelations at the Senate while making submissions before the Ad hoc committee set up by the Senate to look into circumstances that led to the arrest of Zainab Aliyu in Saudi Arabia last year over alleged possession of a banned substance, Tramadol.
Dabiri-Erewa who is also Chairman of the Nigeria Diaspora Commission accused Egypt and Ethiopian Airlines of running drug cartels at Nigeria’s International Airports across the country.
She explained that Zainab Aliyu’s ordeal in Saudi Arabia before the intervention of the Federal Government of Nigeria which led to her release was caused by a drug cartel collaborating with officials of the two airlines.
She said, “We have other foreign and local airlines operating at our airports, but Egyptian and Ethiopian Airlines have drug cartels operating at our International Airports.
“They operate alongside local collaborators. It is not Air Peace, not Arik Air but Egyptian and Ethiopian Airlines.”
When asked by the Chairman of the Committee, Senator Kabiru Gaya ( APC Kano South), about the condition of the scanners, the Airport Chief of Security of the Federal Airport Authority, Lamir, revealed that scanners at the Aminu Kano International Airport in particular, were not configured to detect drugs.