Nigeria and Australia Join Forces to Fight Drug Traffickers

(Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa and Sandra Booth. Photo by Peoples Gazette)

The NDLEA, and Australia's federal police have agreed to work together against drug gangs that move drugs between Nigeria and Australia.

The deal was signed at the NDLEA headquarters in Abuja on Monday, November 2, 2026.

NDLEA chairman Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa, retired, called it a declaration of war on drug cartels that think they can hide across continents.

Under the deal, the two sides will share information, carry out joint operations, train each other and run controlled deliveries, where suspicious shipments are tracked instead of being stopped right away.

Marwa said Nigeria is being used as a transit and buying hub for drugs, and that no single country can fight this alone.

He said the NDLEA has seized 184.5 kilograms of cocaine meant for export and shut down four methamphetamine labs in recent months.

One of the labs had drugs worth more than $360 million.

He also pointed to the breakup of a Switzerland based cartel linked to a Nigerian, Simon Amadi, after work with police in the US, France, Greece and Switzerland.

Sandra Booth, who led the Australian delegation, said the deal will make the fight against drugs much stronger.

She warned that criminal groups use drug money to fund other crimes and recruit young people to deliver drugs and carry out violence.

She said Nigeria is a transit country, while Australia is where many of the drugs end up, because buyers there pay high prices.