JENDEMA – A 41-year-old Sierra Leonean man living at the Liberia-Sierra Leone border has been arrested by Liberian anti-drug officers for attempting to smuggle opioid drugs into Liberia.
The man, Philip Lumeh of Jendema Town in Sorogbema Chiefdom, Pujehun District, was nabbed on Tuesday 23rd September 2026 at about 1:30 p.m. at Gate-2 of the Bo Waterside Port of Entry on the Liberian side.
Lumeh was undergoing routine border checks when officers of the Liberia Drug Enforcement Agency (LDEA) searched his green travelling bag and found 157 strips of Tapentadol/Tramadol – a powerful painkiller commonly abused by youth in Sierra Leone and Liberia.
The drugs, valued at nearly 400,000 Liberian Dollars (over US$2,000), were concealed among his personal effects.
The LDEA says Lumeh, who holds Sierra Leonean nationality, was trying to cross from Jendema into Grand Cape Mount County when he was intercepted.
He is now in LDEA custody at Bo Waterside and will be investigated and charged under Liberia’s drug law.
The arrest comes amid increased joint surveillance by Sierra Leone’s National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) and Liberia’s LDEA along the Jendema-Bo Waterside corridor, which has become a notorious route for Kush, Tramadol and Tapentadol trafficking.
In March, LDEA officers at the same border seized $1.1 million and drugs from a Guinean driver, highlighting the scale of cross-border smuggling.
