Man stacks AK 47 guns inside yam flour and smuggle them into Nigeria’

THE battle to make illegal gun smuggling through Nigerian borders difficult has begun with the arrest of a multi-million-naira illegal gun dealer, Abdulazeez Amao, by men of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, Lagos State Command.

  A suspected international gun-runner who has been on the wanted list of the Police, he was arrested by the Command sequel to an intelligence gathered on their activities on the nation’s gateway in Seme.  The alleged gun dealer Amao and his “middle-man” Olatunji Tubosun are now being interrogated at SARS. 

  Recovered from the suspects were 10 new AK47 rifles and 19 AK7 magazines all loaded with 30 rounds of ammunition.The alleged kingpin, who spoke to newsmen at the parade ground of the State Police Command Headquarters GRA, Ikeja, said he was “importing the arms and ammunition from Burkina Faso.”
 

    “I was introduced into the business by one Gbenga. I am a serious smuggler, but I do any other business that comes my way, so when Gbenga promised to sponsor me to Burkina Faso, I grabbed the offer because, if there is no venture there won’t be success. One of my wives is from Ouagadougu, capital of Burkina Faso, so I was able to mix up and got connected to one Zakari Watara who brings in arms and ammunition from Mali to Burkina Faso. So I would buy from him and import to my country, Nigeria.” 

  “I was able to beat security operatives in Mali by packaging my consignments into milk cartons. When I arrived Paraku town in Benin Republic, I would now repackage the arms and ammunition into bags containing yam flour (elubo) and then transport them to Ibadan, Oyo state through Kabo border.” 

  “Gbenga who introduced me into the gun deal is the person that also introduced Tubosun who was bringing buyers to me. I don’t care whom he brings to buy my guns, I was not investigating who he was bringing as what matters to me is my money. I used to buy one AK47 for 600,0000CFA, equivalent of N200, 000 and resold it for N320, 000.Tubosun is a good guy because he used to pay me cash but I was shocked that he was bringing armed robbers to buy arms and ammunition from me,” he revealed.  Amao’s middleman, Tubosun, told newsmen that he was only bringing hunters to his master.  

  “I am a farmer and a hunter. We are being attacked in the bush by some land grabbers, we used the rifles to defend ourselves.”  The Commissioner Of Police, Alhaji Umar Manko who paraded the suspects said, based on information he received and subsequent directives, he engaged the Officer-in-Charge of SARS, Abba Kyari. 

  “We were informed that one suspected armed robber Olatunji was arrested at Subaru area of Ikorodu, Lagos, with an Ak47 rifle and after he was quizzed by Kyari he confessed that he bought it from Amao a notorious arms dealer in Ibadan,” Manko said.

  He noted that his officer deployed “decoy” police team to Ibadan who arrested Amao.

  “He confessed that he has sold several other AK47 rifles and English pistols to many buyers in Oyo, Lagos and Anambra states.

  Manko said effort was being made to recover the arms from the armed robbers who bought from him and to arrest the Burkina Faso dealer through the assistance of the International Police (Interpol).