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NDEA to destroy seized drugs

Jul 2, 2012, 2:41 PM

The National Drug Enforcement Agency (NDEA) will tomorrow embark on a massive public drug destruction exercise.

The exercise, said to be part of the activities marking the commemoration of the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking, will among others witness the destruction of “all drugs that are due for public destruction both at the level of the court and the NDEA.”

Though no specific figure as to the amount of drugs to be destroyed were given, readers would recall that sometime in May 2010, 12 foreign nationals were arrested, prosecuted and jailed by the Banjul Magistrates’ Court for being in possession of cocaine amounting to two and half tonnes.

They were, among others, accused of conspiring, with others now at large, to traffic in various measures of cocaine and other prohibited drugs totalling  to more than two and a half tonnes in diverse places in The Gambia, between 2009 and May 2010, and at a warehouse located in the village of Bonto.

It is also worth noting that in November 2010, the NDEA destroyed 1 tonne, 113 kilograms, 255 grams of cannabis sativa and 1 kilogram, 280 grams of cocaine at an exercise held at the Old Cape Road along Cape Point in Bakau.