Cocaine lands Nigerian in prison for 8 years

By: WERNER MENGES

A NIGERIAN national who admitted that he smuggled just over a kilogram of swallowed cocaine into Namibia early this year was sentenced to an effective prison term of eight years on Friday.

Drug dealers are unscrupulous criminals, and the courts have a duty to protect society against their activities, Magistrate Sarel Jacobs remarked during the sentencing of Chukwujekwu Nwoye Okaforudeji (35) in the Windhoek Regional Court.
Okaforudeji pleaded guilty to a charge of dealing in dangerous dependence-producing drugs on July 27. He admitted that he was caught bringing 1,027 kilograms of cocaine, valued at about N$513 000, into Namibia on February 25 this year.
In a plea explanation provided to Magistrate Jacobs, Okaforudeji said he was arrested after arriving at Hosea Kutako International Airport east of Windhoek on the morning of February 25. He admitted that he was carrying the cocaine in plastic tubes in his abdomen.
The court was told that Okaforudeji is a married father of two children. According to him, he was acting as a drug courier for an Angolan person on whose behalf he was smuggling the cocaine from Brazil into Namibia.
He agreed to do this job because he was unemployed and needed money to care for his family, Okaforudeji claimed. He would have been paid N$13 000 for bringing the cocaine from Brazil, the court was told.
“Namibia is threatened by offences relating to drugs,” Magistrate Jacobs said during the sentencing.
He told Okaforudeji it would be an invitation to lawlessness if unemployment and the need to support one’s family were to be accepted as an excuse for dealing in drugs.
Magistrate Jacobs said he agreed with a statement made by a South African court in a case that also involved drug-dealing. The magistrate quoted those remarks: “Drug dealers are unscrupulous criminals. They will use the weak, the gullible and may I add the greedy. They are without conscience. They do not care for those who facilitate their evil objectives, nor do they have a concern about the lives they ruin by trafficking in drugs. Society is at risk should it hesitate to use every legitimate mechanism at its disposal to protect itself against their destructive designs.”
Okaforudeji’s lawyer, Chris Brandt, suggested that his client should be sentenced to pay a fine. Fining him would not be a proper sentence, though, the magistrate decided.
Okaforudeji knew what he was doing and from the way the crime was committed it is clear that it was a well-planned offence, Magistrate Jacobs said.
He sentenced Okaforudeji to ten years’ imprisonment, of which two years were suspended for a period of five years on condition that Okaforudeji is not again convicted on a charge of dealing in or possessing cocaine that had been committed during the period of suspension.
Ingrid Husselmann conducted the prosecution in the trial.

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