Mass resignation of top officers hit NDLEA

Victor Cole-showers, until recently, a serving Commander of Narcotics at the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) was a quintessential officer.

His faith-based integrity as having zero- tolerance for corruption was unassailable. Even his rank mates deferred to him- ‘God fearing and righteous’ in the real sense of the word.

At the onset of Alhaji Ahmadu Giade's regime as Chairman and Chief Executive of the Agency in 2005, there was a consensus that only Cole-showers would be able  to handle the Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA) Command of the Agency, which is  regarded as the "most tempting and juicy" of all the Agency formations.

Cole-showers did not waste the confidence reposed on him. He symbolically divorced his family and other social distractions to enable a 24-hour policing of the MMIA, the leading drug trafficking route in the country.

Arrest of drug offenders and seizure of the illicit drugs began to tumble in as if on their own accord.

 In six months, Cole-showers bagged a special promotion from Alhaji Giade in appreciation of his landmarks.

Little did Cole-showers know that the Giade regime only needed him to gain credibility. Three years after, Cole-showers was sent to "school", the National Defence College to pave way for Alhaji Giade's ‘anointed one’ to take over the MMIA Command.

Cole-Sowers was literally abandoned to fend for his expenses at the executive College as against other students that were fully catered for by their organisations.

From the Defence College where he gave a good account of himself, an obscure Pensions Unit, a much lower office was reserved for him by Ahmadu Giade while he had already mounted his preferred candidate at the MMIA command.

As Cole-showers was radically poised to transform the Pensions Unit, working hand in hand with the Director General for the administrative growth of the Agency, Giade allegedly plucked him again and threw him to Rivers State where the Agency lacked the least logistics to combat the drug scourge, an action which allegedly smacks of vindictiveness.

The signs were now clear to Cole-showers that his kind of commitment was no longer needed in the Agency and that he needed to take a swift action before he would be rubbished. Few weeks ago, Cole-showers bowed out voluntarily sending shock waves across the Agency’s formations that something is wrong at the agency.

The officers and men of the Agency were battling to swallow the bitter reality of Cole-Showers action, when news made the rounds that Suleiman Ningi, another Commander of Narcotics who is Alhaji Giade's Special Assistant had also sent notice of his withdrawal of Service from the Agency.

As at press time, Alhaji Giade is still on Mr. Ningi's neck to withdraw the notice so as not to send a wrong signal or to make worse an already bad situation.
Ningi would have been the second Special Assistants to resign since Mr.  Giade came to the Agency.

The first was Muazu Umar, who left almost at the same time with Giade's first Chief Security Officer.

Emmanuel Oguche, appointed by Giade as Special Assistant to the Director General of the Agency also withdrew his service, not too long ago.

Oguche took over from one Mr. Abah who had earlier found his way out of the Agency.

If Ningi would rescind his decision, Femi Oloruntoba, an Assistant Commander General of Narcotics, who for more than four years running, did not lose a single case as the Director of Prosecution of NDLEA is contemplating going on secondment to the Federal Ministry of Justice.

Recently, Alhaji Giade forced the seasoned lawyer out of the Directorate of Prosecution. Oloruntoba is to now serve as Director of Maintenance, where he lacks expertise, an action that has caused him to seek career fulfilment elsewhere.

 He too; has sent his letter of disengagement.
Agency sources told this correspondent that these names are just to mention but a few and that the gale of resignation from the Agency has reached an alarming stage.

"There is no passing week where officers are not tendering their letter of resignation in droves, especially those who are stagnated for an upward of eight to 13 years without promotion”, a senior staff quipped.

 According to the officer, the mass resignation is caused by frustrations officers go through daily which has been compounded by alarming rate of mysterious death of officers.

 "The Agency has become an organisation that devours it inhabitants. “It is pathetic and fearful”. That is how a junior staff summarised the mystery death ravaging the agency.  “NDLEA has been turned into a horbesean society where life is brutish and short”, a staff who pleaded anonymity recounted.

"Death is flowing freely in the Agency. Officers have no choice but to run for their dear life. I am contemplating it too”.

According to the officer's account, the only source of worry in the past about the Agency was officers who were attacked and killed by drug dealers. "Today, we have had so many sad events of officers dying in their sleep or after brief illness. Some just slumped and the next thing is death. In fact, some even hang themselves as a result of career frustration”, the officer said.

The officer, without consulting any list rolled out names of his colleagues that have died mysteriously between 2010 and 2013 numbering more than 40 personnel.

"These few names are those ones I can remember now. Official figure cannot be less than 100 that have died mysteriously under Alhaji Giade's regime. This is astonishing compared to the Agency's total staff figure of barely 4, 000. Is this not alarming? Can this be ordinary?" the officer piqued. “Officers are dying as if there is an epidemic outbreak in the Agency. From the look of things, the Agency is becoming an open cemetery”, says another officer, fighting tears.

Officers who spoke to Daily Newswatch were quick to link the present trend to some bizarre developments in the time past which had a ritual undertone, the effect of which might be manifesting now.

The officers recalled that just about the end of 2009, the Agency was awash with stories of "juju scare," with blood littering the whole headquarter premises as officers turned up to work every morning.

 It was in the same way officers reported for work each day only to see the whole headquarters' premises pork -marked with fresh plastered holes, suggesting that strange objects had been buried.

"Agency at a point became an open shrine of some sort. The saddest thing is that all these occult manipulations could only be traceable within the Agency headquarters because it is well guarded by armed personnel. So, how then can an outsider or just an ordinary person come to plant all these at night," our source queried.

Matters were said to have come to a peak, precisely when speculations were rife that there might be changes at the agency. Some officers recalled vividly how one Saturday morning a young lad excavated five nails within the office premises and replaced them with another new five new nails.

The then Director of Technical Services, Abiodun Adesola cemented up the surface.
"A common sight within the headquarters was the alleged frequent visit of five men robbed in white from head to toe who go around the headquarters offering all manner of incantations. They were alleged to keep playing around figure five each time they come.
 Some staff has called on the Federal Government to investigate and stop the mystery deaths ravaging the agency.

 Our source said that the Federal Government through its Human Rights Commission needed to do something quickly, because the greater majority of officers are trapped in the Agency and need to be rescued.
As the officers are bemoaning the indiscriminate loss of their colleagues, news filtered in that the police orderly attached to Alhaji Giade, by name ASP Chuks, has died after a brief illness, reinforcing speculations that something mystery is going on in the Agency.  This is the roll call of mystery deaths ravaging NDLEA in the last three years. Adesola Abiodun, Funsho Salami, Rahala Malgwi and one Ekong. Others are Adagboyi Christopher, Midala Wesley, former Lagos State Commander, Frank Aigbefo, and Chukwuma, alias Chuks-police officer attached to Giade, Amaka Egbunike and Shola Awepeju.

Following these people are also Danburam Abdullahi, former MMIA commander alleged to be a thorn in Giade's flesh, having a running battle with Giade over his indiscriminate retirement and Etuk Usuro. Included in these fatal lists are officers killed in Delta state and their colleagues who were killed in Akure by barons. 

The families of Ilya Peni and one officer in Bayelsa who lost their life are still wondering what has happened to their breadwinners.

Also in the list are John Mahuta Yusuf, one Mathias, the DSO, Lagos State Command, Lawrence Ojonugwa, Asu Allen, Samuel Omeje and Musa Yohanna. Today, the agency also lost Cletus Indeyeyor, Aliyu Momodu, Kayode Aiyenugba, Harira Abubakar, Julie Yori, Usman Askira and Friday Malu who hanged himself one afternoon.

Meanwhile, two officers died on their way for the CNA course training, another one died in Lokoja while returning from Jos after examination while one died at NDLEA Aja Quarters while crossing the road to buy recharge card as Gideon Azumara slept to death. All these deaths happened within three years. The fear was that none of them suffered serious illness before they gave up the ghost.

Reacting to the allegations and resignations that have hit the agency, the Public Relations Officer of the Agency, Mitchell Ofoyeju debunked the mass resignation story and said people have right to aspire for greater challenges in their respective endeavours. According to Ofoyeju, the resignation of the mentioned officers was not as a result of so-called ‘imaginative frustration’ at the agency. The agency’s spokesman said there are no frustration whatsoever at the agency.

 He quipped that this era in the agency was the best era so far enjoyed by the officers and men of the agency because of the international collaborations enjoyed by the agency.

He disclosed that the seizures and arrests during Giade’s time showed the level the organization has gone globally using the international network and intelligence gathering of the other world anti-drug agencies. Ofoyeju said through Giade, the agency’s rotten image and wrong global perception have been corrected.

According to Ofoyeju, Victor Cole-showers resigned to go and take full time ministration adding that he has been a part time pastor but have decided to go full fledged pastor job.

 He also explained that those who resigned have their individual reasons for their resignations but stated that it wasn’t because of frustration in the agency.

For the multiple and mystery deaths in the last three years, he said it was unfortunate that people are not objective in their criticisms of the agency.

He said that death of officers have nothing to do with rituals or manipulations of anybody. “Does it mean that people don’t die in the other agencies”? He queried.

“It will be wrong for people to start insinuating what is not”.

Ofoyeju said the deaths have no connection to any ritual activities but that they were all natural occurrences. He said the agency is one of the risky jobs and that officers face challenges on daily basis.