Washington – When authorities in Liberia unraveled a US$19 million drug bust at the Roberts International Airport last week, echoes of a familiar refrain ricochet across West Africa, a still fragile region that has experienced civil wars and unrest in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.
By Rodney D. Sieh, rodney.sieh@frontpageafricaonline.com
The 198 compressed plates of cocaine, weighing 237.6 kilograms, were concealed in cargo boxes. The narcotics were prepared for exportation to Europe via a Brussels Airlines flight operations route.
IG Coleman, Security Officials Summoned by Dutch
A Margibi County court ordered airport management to turn over CCTV footage, waybills, and shipping documents to map out the trafficking network. The case has triggered significant public debate and political pressure in Liberia regarding security transparency and the identity of the perpetrators.
Liberia and Sierra Leone are connected as a primary transit route for drugs flooding across land borders, like the Bo Waterside crossing, into Liberia.
While security agencies in Liberia are yet to name prime suspects behind the bust, many diplomats in the West African sub-region are turning some attention to Liberia’s next-door neighbor, Sierra Leone, where Jos Leijdekkers resides and is enjoying the full protection of President Maada Bio and his government.
An investigation by FrontPageAfrica has found that Leijdekkers has been in and out of Liberia under the cloak of darkness, engaging with some prominent figures in Liberia over the past year, crossing over from his hideout haven in Freetown and engaging in unscrupulous activities in Liberia relating to narcotics.
The movement, one Western diplomat told FrontPageAfrica this week, has triggered the attention of authorities in Leijdekkers’ homeland, the Netherlands and Belgium, where he also has a number of charges related to narcotics hanging over his head.
S. Leone, Liberia – Safe Haven for Fugitive
This, FPA has learned, prompted Dutch and Belgian authorities to seek a meeting with the head of the Liberia National Police, Gregory Coleman, and some senior security officials from Liberia who are due in Washington this weekend as part of a joint operation aimed at exploring the alleged involvement of Leijdekkers in a series of drug operations in Liberia in recent months.
Leijdekkers is a convicted international drug lord and Europe’s most wanted fugitive. He was sentenced in absentia in the Netherlands and Belgium to over 80 years in prison for massive cocaine trafficking, contract killings, and money laundering. He was sentenced to 24 years in prison by a Rotterdam court for trafficking nearly 7,000 kilograms of cocaine, ordering a contract killing, and armed robbery, and subsequently handed an additional 8-year sentence in Belgium.
Leijdekker is also linked by European investigators to massive transnational cocaine shipments, including a record maritime bust near the Canary Islands involving over 30,000 kilograms of cocaine. The Netherlands has formally requested his extradition, and the EU has been intervening to pressure Sierra Leone to hand him over, threatening to cut millions of dollars in development aid if the country continues to harbor him.
Over the last months, drug trafficking between Liberia and Sierra Leone has been at an all-time high.
Worrying Circumstances
Global experts examining international cartels point to worrying signs in the Liberian drug bust. Key concerns include the fact that such a quantum of drugs was about to be shipped in pallets from Liberia to a major destination, which indicates a well-organized cartel entrenched within Liberia. Huge quantities of drugs coming to a country require the acquiescence or tacit approval of certain officials in the country’s Customs operations, which means Port Security, NPA, APM Terminal, and some personnel might be involved. Then the drugs have to be taken to safe warehouses, which means security must accompany the shipment. In many countries, poorly paid police officers usually moonlight by protecting drug lords with supervision by police brass. Warehousing, storage, packaging, and labeling require a great deal of sophistication to allow entry into North America or Europe.
The seeming money movements in such operations would require the support of bankers, people in financial intelligence, and sometimes central bank personnel.
Diplomatic watchers say the sophistication of the Liberian drug runners provides pause for concern for international partners and thus the efforts to get solid feedback from Liberian security officials on their knowledge or lack thereof.
A String of Drug Busts
On March 17 last year, a vehicle traveling from Sierra Leone to Monrovia through Lofa County was intercepted by the Joint Security of Foya District, led by the Liberia Drug Enforcement Agency (LDEA). The street value of the significant drug shipment is estimated at $77,200.
A thorough search of the vehicle revealed 772 plates of high-grade marijuana, valued at approximately $77,200 (14,668,000 Liberian dollars), as well as eight boxes of Tramadol worth an additional 160,000 Liberian dollars.
The driver was immediately arrested.
Similarly, in December 2024, a driver attached to the embassy of Sierra Leone in Guinea was arrested with seven suitcases of cocaine.
The issue prompted Dutch Minister of Justice David van Weel to announced on X (formerly known as Twitter) that he had a conversation with his colleague, Alpha Sesay, Sierra Leone’s Attorney General and Minister of Justice regarding the Dutch extradition request for Leijdekkers.
Both the Dutch and Belgian authorities have been vocal that Leijdekkers’ presence in the region is problematic, hampering the fight against transnational organized crime.
Leijdekkers has not shied away from the public eye in his haven in Sierra Leone. Last year, President Bio relieved Alusine Kanneh of his position as head of the immigration service after a video surfaced showing Kanneh partying with Leijdekkers, who is known as Omar Sherriff in Sierra Leone.
$100 Million Drug Bust Redux
In 2023, four men – a Liberian, a Portuguese, a Lebanese and a Guinea-Bissau national – were arrested while trying to get hold of 520 kilograms of cocaine smuggled in from Brazil.
Despite overwhelming evidence, authorities later announced that the four suspected drug traffickers involved in the sting worth $100M escaped the country.
Then in May that year, a court in the Liberian capital of Monrovia found them not guilty and ordered the return of $200,000 in cash taken from them.
That case is raising fears that similar results may unfold in the most recent case of the US$19 million cocaine bust at the RIA.
While President Joseph Boakai has declared drug and substance abuse a national public health emergency, the lingering crisis, largely driven by the influx of a cheap and toxic synthetic drug called “kush,” affects a significant portion of Liberia’s youth.
The ruling Unity Party-led government, like its predecessor, former President George Weah, faces immense political scrutiny regarding its handling of large-scale narcotics shipments and accusations of systemic complicity.
Pressure Mounting
As the Boakai administration continues to drag its feet on zeroing in on the prime players involved in the latest drug sting, activists and opposition politicians continue to pressure the government to move past rhetorical policies and conduct uncompromised, independent investigations into the financial and logistical networks facilitating the drug trade.
More importantly, the presence of Leijdekkers in the region is raising eyebrows and growing concerns that an unchecked drug trafficking climate could fuel unrest and chaos in the region once more.
While acknowledging the security threats and risks involved in the wake of the latest drug bust, Cllr. N. Oswald Tweh, Minister of Justice, says the Boakai administration is taking the matter seriously.
The minister told a joint legislative hearing Tuesday that the matter has been elevated to national security level, and the joint security has been mandated to do a joint investigation. “This decision is not only in the supreme interest of our country because it is this government’s determination not to treat this matter simply as a narcotics case, but as a significant national security threat. We note the quantity of cocaine seized for export. It means it was in the country.”
Fitzgerald T.M. Biago, Officer-In-Charge, Liberia Drug Enforcement Agency, did not rule out the possibility of an international network being in play. “It is possible linked to organized crime networks that are operating in the Sahel. The LDEA commenced an active investigation.
Biago told the legislative hearing Tuesday that when the LDEA went to the Robert International Airport, it was able to gather CCTV footage and video recordings that are in the LDEA’s possession.
Gol Defiant Amid Calls for Arrests
The LDEA, according to Biago, has since made recommendations to the national security council based on the elevation of the importance attached to this case.
Said Biago, “While it is true that we are OIC, this investigation involved multi-layered and multi-dimensional activity; we recommended to the NSC that the investigation be elevated to the NSC and the joint security investigation team be formed to look at the circumstances leading to the investigation. Today the NSC has taken charge of the matter, and the MOJ and the national security advisor are spearheading the investigation.”
John Buway, Deputy Manager for Technical Services at the RIA, to the legislative hearing on Tuesday that it is the airport’s responsibility to screen goods or cargo when they come or leave the airport.
So, how did the traffickers slip through the cracks? That is the million-dollar question lingering in the court of public opinion and a puzzle for international stakeholders.
For Buway, the national security apparatus, comprising LDEA, police, and all other national security agencies, is the ones who receive whatever cargo that will come. Police, Immigration, LDEA. “We are responsible for screening the cargo. Check for a couple of things: the weight of the cargo that will get on the plane, what is in that cargo. Our screeners checked what raised this alarm. And clearly, it was the weight was different from the weight in the X-ray machine. And that was sufficient for the screeners to set the cargo aside.”
Key person-of-interest expected from China
Even amid mounting calls for arrests and a more transparent investigative process, the government remains defiant. “We will not give any more information as we continue with this investigation,” Justice Minister Tweah averred Tuesday. “All of that will be protected during this ongoing investigation. We are willing to provide information, guided by wisdom, but if you are asking for every detail of the investigation, I think that would be detrimental.”
While authorities remain tight-lipped on the details, FrontPageAfrica has gathered that a key person of interest is due in Monrovia today.
Multiple sources confirmed to FrontPageAfrica that Oscar Browne, a security intelligence supervisor at the airport, was in China attending a China-sponsored aviation seminar when he called another person-of-interest, Roland Taylor, a senior security trainer, the day of the drug bust, asking Taylor to ensure that the consignment was released to board the flight after Benjamin Rivercess, another person-of-interest, refused to let it go.
What remains unclear is whether authorities plan to arrest Browne when he touches down via Ethiopian Airlines today. “If this is a serious government, Browne will be arrested upon touchdown tomorrow,” a person close to the investigation told FPA late Tuesday.
No one will be spared, says JNB
Despite public skepticism on the matter, President Joseph Boakai, in his first address to the nation on Tuesday, maintained that while Liberia is open for business, Liberia is not open for the business of drug trafficking,” the President declared. “Liberia will not be used as a haven, transit point, warehouse, financial center, or operational base by criminal networks engaged in narcotics trafficking.”
The President’s address comes amid growing public concern and demands for transparency following the seizure, which has triggered intense public debate and calls for the government to disclose the identities of those connected to the shipment.
Some critics have taken the President to task over his revelation that he has ordered the investigation to be conducted under the authority of the National Security Council through the National Joint Security architecture.
Said the President: “The probe is being coordinated by the Liberia Drug Enforcement Agency (LDEA) and the Liberia National Police (LNP), with support from several security and law enforcement institutions, including the National Security Agency (NSA), Financial Intelligence Agency (FIA), Liberia Immigration Service, Customs authorities, airport security, and the Ministry of Justice.”
Considering the alleged involvement of several security and airport personnel, critics are unsure such an investigation would remain impartial.
Nevertheless, the President says investigators have been instructed to pursue the case on two fronts: identifying and prosecuting those directly involved in the shipment and dismantling the broader criminal enterprise behind the operation. “We are not interested only in intercepting drugs or arresting couriers,” Boakai said. “We are determined to expose and destroy the networks that finance, coordinate, facilitate, and profit from this criminal activity.”
The President stressed that no individual or institution would be protected from scrutiny as the investigation progresses. “This investigation will follow the evidence wherever it leads,” he said. “No person will be untouchable. No institution will be shielded from scrutiny. No criminal network will escape justice.”
On paper, President Boakai appears to be saying the right things, but many critics are unsure, considering the level of involvement of top security and airport brass.
Whatever the outcome, local and international pressure is mounting, with some suggestions that the Boakai-led Unity Party government may be forced to rethink a complete overhaul of the security sector to appease concerns from international stakeholders that it is losing the war on drugs and allowing a fugitive like Leijdekker an easy pathway to Liberia, gradually cementing itself as a rapidly growing narcotics transit point.
