By Ebi Kesiena
A Federal High Court in Lagos has sentenced 20 Ghanaian fishermen to one-year imprisonment for transporting marijuana from Ghana to Nigeria.
They were found guilty of the charges of conspiracy and unlawful transportation of the substance.
The fishermen were arrested for shipping 13.670 kilograms of cannabis from Ghana to Nigerian waters on January 14, 2022.
The prosecuter for the convicts, Mr Fingere Owen claimed in court that their offences were contrary and punishable under sections 11(b) and 14(b) of the Nigerian National Drug Law Enforcement Agency Act Cap. N30, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004.
The defendants pleaded guilty to the charges begging the court for leniency since they were first time offenders and were unaware of the contents in the bag which contained the weed.
Justice Oweibo sentenced them to one-year imprisonment and ordered the convicts to pay the sum of N50,000 each in lieu of the sentence. He also ordered the boat used for smuggling confiscated to the Federal Government.
