Four suspected drug traffickers were apprehended on Tuesday at the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos, including two men who had ingested 124 wraps of liquid cocaine sealed in condoms.

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency confirmed, in a statement, that the two suspects – Egbo Innocent Oluchukwu, 43, and Ejimbe Christian Chidi, a 32-year-old teacher – had excreted 70 and 54 sealed condom wraps of liquid cocaine respectively, weighing approximately 3.3kg.

According to the statement, the two suspects had arrived at the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos from Venezuela.

“The 43-year-old who claimed to reside in Venezuela for 10 years said that the Venezuelan who gave him the drug, told him that it will be difficult for the scanning machine to detect ingested liquid cocaine and promised him a reward of $6,000 (about N930,000).

“The 32-year-old suspect who also claimed to be teaching English at a Language School in Venezuela, said that he was promised a reward of N 4 million,’’ the NDLEA Commander Hamza Umar said in the statement.

Hamza said it was the first case of “liquid cocaine ingestion in the country”.

Both men pleaded for leniency, saying the difficulty of their financial circumstances pushed them to a life of crime.

“I ingested 70 wraps of the drug using water because I was desperate,” Oluchukwu, who is married with two children, said.

“It is not that drug trafficking is a good thing but I wanted to solve my personal problem. They promised to pay me the sum of $6,000,” Egbo said.

English teacher Chidi also claimed he had been motivated by noble intentions, saying he had planned to “get married and settle down”

The other two suspects were arrested at the airport for allegedly importing an unknown amount of heroin into the country from Tanzania.

The trafficking duo, 28-year-old auto dealer Ezeani Obinna and 27-year-old electrical parts dealer Ozoemena Okoye Samuel, both from Lagos, had thought to sneak into the country with the drugs undetected.

However, the men were discovered by a screening machine at the airport.

Hamza promised the NDLEA would continue in its work to apprehend drug traffickers.