When the word “Classroom” is heard, the first set of words to come to mind includes, education, students, teachers, discipline. one would never associate it with the word “Indian Hemp” across your mind, but this was the exact case as the Ekiti State command of the National Drugs Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has announced the discovery of 122 kilogrammes of cannabis sativa, more commonly known as Indian hemp, hid inside one of the classrooms in a private secondary school in Ado Ekiti, the state capital.
The NDLEA told newsmen in Ado Ekiti on Wednesday that the hemp was “inside 10 sacks and were dumped there by unknown drug dealers apparently because the NDLEA has dislodged the drugs dealers from their hideouts in the state capital.”
According to the Assistant Commander of NDLEA in the state, Mr Samson Ofila, following the dislodgment of the drug dealers at Atikankan and Ojunmose, as well as other drug points in the state capital which gave way to the urban renewal project of the state government, the dealers were looking for all kinds of space to hide their illicit merchandise.
Officials of the Operations and Intelligence unit of the command, who spoke on behalf of the state commander of NDLEA, Mr Bamidele Akingbade, explained that the owner of the school saw the exhibits and quickly came to report his finding to the NDLEA.
According to him, “the efforts being made by Ekiti NDLEA command had made it difficult for drug dealers in the state to find a safe place to store their drugs,” adding that “last month, a task force was set up to raid all the notorious joints in Ado Ekiti’s supply of hard drugs to Ekiti State.
“This led to drastic reduction of hemp in the state and a lot of cannabis sativa plantations in the state have been destroyed, which made available ones expensive and difficult for many of them to purchase.”
The NDLEA chief disclosed that six drug dealers arrested recently in the state were taken to the palace of the Ado Ekiti traditional ruler, Oba Adeyemo Adejugbe, and were made to swear an oath that they will leave Ekiti State and not come back, adding that “the action was taken to ensure they don’t come back to destroy the state with hard drugs.”