Nigerian Court Convicts 11 Indian Sailors and Merchant Vessel in $6 Million Cocaine Trafficking Case
A Federal High Court in Lagos convicted eleven Indian sailors and their merchant vessel on Thursday, June 11, ordering combined fines and restitution of approximately $6 million over the trafficking of 31.5 kilograms of cocaine into Nigeria through the Apapa seaport — a case that concluded less than six months after the drugs were seized.
Justice Joseph Chukwujekwu Aneke delivered the ruling after accepting a plea bargain agreement reached between the prosecution and defence in suit number FHC/L/56C/2026. The case dates to January 2, 2026, when operatives of Nigeria’s National Drug Law Enforcement Agency discovered the cocaine inside Hatch 3 of the MV Aruna Hulya at the GDNL terminal, Apapa port. The vessel had arrived from the Marshall Islands. Inside Retail Asia
The Arrests and the Charges
The NDLEA took into custody the Indian crew members and their merchant vessel following the discovery of 31.5 kilograms of cocaine in Hatch 3 of the ship. The master of the vessel, Sharma Shashi Bhushan, and 10 other crew members — Bharati Manoj Kumar, Nevage Sandesh Suresh, Pandey Prashant, Nuttu Anand, Akash Babu, Nilesh Mukuno Bhalerad, Melethil Insaf Rahman, Barla Chantanya Krishna, Prabhasukhan Singu, and Jai Parkash — were eventually arraigned on a two-count charge before Justice Aneke. Wikipedia
The vessel itself was listed as the first defendant — a legal approach that has become a defining feature of Nigeria’s maritime drug enforcement strategy, enabling courts to impose direct financial penalties on ships as legal persons.
The Sentence
The court convicted all 12 defendants under Section 25 of the NDLEA Act and ordered each crew member to pay a fine of N100,000, the statutory penalty prescribed under the Act. The vessel, MV Aruna Hulya, was directed to pay $5.3 million — or its naira equivalent — as restitution to the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Fox News
Three principal officers of the vessel — Sharma Shashi Bhushan, Nilesh Mukuno Bhalerad, and Melethil Insaf Rahman — were ordered to pay $100,000 each, while the remaining crew members were directed to pay $50,000 each in restitution. The aggregate of crew restitution payments brings the total penalty to approximately $6 million. Fox News
NDLEA Reaction
NDLEA Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, retired Brigadier-General Mohamed Buba Marwa, described the ruling as one of the largest financial penalties imposed in a recent Nigerian drug trafficking case involving foreign crew members and a commercial vessel. “Nigeria is no longer a safe corridor for cocaine or any other illicit substance,” Marwa said in a statement on Thursday. investing
Marwa noted that the conviction was the third of its kind in recent times, following the convictions of foreign nationals and vessels on similar charges. “Let it be known that these are not coincidences, they are the direct result of deliberate, intelligence-led operations by our officers who remain vigilant at every port of entry. The NDLEA will not relent. Whether you come by air, land, or sea; whether you are a Nigerian or a foreign national, you will face the full weight of Nigerian law,” he said. Wikipedia
A Pattern of Maritime Convictions
The MV Aruna Hulya case is the third maritime drug trafficking conviction secured by the NDLEA in just over a year, establishing a clear prosecutorial pattern at Apapa port.
In May 2025, a Federal High Court in Lagos convicted ten Thai sailors and their vessel, MV Chayanee Naree, for smuggling 32.9 kilograms of cocaine from Brazil into Nigeria through the Apapa seaport, imposing a total fine of $4.36 million on the vessel and its crew. The arrests in that case had been made in October 2021, following an intelligence tip from the UK Border Force. Business Today
In March 2026, a Lagos court imposed approximately $6 million in fines on ten Filipino sailors for smuggling 20 kilograms of cocaine through the same port. The escalating penalty amounts across successive maritime cases reflect a deliberate prosecutorial strategy: each plea bargain agreement results in a higher restitution figure, calibrated to the scale of the drug consignment and the financial exposure of the shipping company. katadata
In the first quarter of 2026 alone, the NDLEA recorded 974 convictions nationwide, including 11 major drug kingpins who collectively received 254 years in prison. set
Regional and Global Impact
West Africa’s role in global cocaine trafficking has shifted significantly over the past decade. Traditionally a transit zone for South American cocaine moving toward European markets, Nigeria and its ports have increasingly featured in seizure and conviction data as law enforcement has intensified. The Apapa port — Lagos’s primary commercial seaport and the busiest in West Africa — sits at the intersection of major shipping lanes connecting South America, Europe, and Asia.
Marwa attributed the outcome to enhanced surveillance and enforcement operations at ports of entry and said the ruling demonstrated the effectiveness of the agency’s intelligence-led operations, underscoring Nigeria’s determination to block drug trafficking routes. U.S. News & World Report
The rapid prosecution timeline — from arrest on January 2 to conviction on June 11, a span of under six months — is significant. The previous Thai sailor case took more than three years from arrest to verdict. The compression of the MV Aruna Hulya timeline, achieved through plea bargaining, signals that the NDLEA has refined its maritime prosecution framework to reduce case duration without sacrificing financial penalties.
Background
The NDLEA was established in 1990 and operates under the NDLEA Act, which provides for the prosecution of both individuals and vessels involved in drug trafficking. Section 25 of the NDLEA Act, under which all defendants in the MV Aruna Hulya case were convicted, covers offences related to permitting the use of a vessel for the unlawful transportation of controlled substances. The MV Chayanee Naree case established the precedent of imposing vessel-level restitution in addition to individual crew fines, a model replicated and expanded in subsequent maritime prosecutions. Apapa port handles the vast majority of Nigeria’s container imports and has been identified by the NDLEA as a primary target for maritime drug interdiction operations. Marwa, who has led the agency since 2021, has made high-profile maritime enforcement a centrepiece of his tenure. deccanheraldBusiness Today
What Happens Next
The court directed that MV Aruna Hulya pay its $5.3 million restitution to the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the sum ordered or its equivalent in naira. The NDLEA did not confirm whether the vessel has been released from detention or whether enforcement proceedings will begin to recover the restitution amount. The agency has a separate case still pending from its November 2025 interception of another vessel, MV Nord Bosporus, carrying 20 kilograms of cocaine from the Brazilian port of Santos — indicating that Apapa port’s role as a site of active maritime drug interdiction continues beyond the conclusion of the MV Aruna Hulya prosecution. Fox News
