Reported by Ariajegbe Sylvia Esezobor
The Nigeria Police Force has repatriated a Chinese national wanted by authorities in his home country over the large-scale smuggling of endangered African rosewood, closing a chapter on a fugitive who had been living quietly in Ogun State with an expired passport. Zhang Shijie, who was declared wanted by the Yangpu Sub-Bureau of the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of Haikou Customs District in China, was arrested in the Ogere area of Ogun State on September 10, 2026, and flown to Guangzhou on September 16, 2026, according to a statement issued by the Force Public Relations Officer, Chief Superintendent of Police Ani Iniedu. The repatriation was carried out through the INTERPOL National Central Bureau in Abuja as part of bilateral police cooperation between Nigeria and China.
Zhang is accused of involvement in the smuggling of approximately 1,400 tonnes of Pterocarpus erinaceus, commonly known as African rosewood, a slow-growing hardwood indigenous to West Africa that has become one of the world’s most trafficked illegal wildlife products. The consignment was valued at about 15.7 million Chinese yuan. The alleged offences were committed between November 2020 and January 2021, and a warrant for his arrest was issued on January 7, 2021. He subsequently left China and remained outside the country, eventually settling in Nigeria. Intelligence later established that he was residing in Ogun State using a Chinese passport that expired on November 11, 2023. Following sustained intelligence gathering, surveillance and coordinated investigative efforts, operatives of INTERPOL NCB Abuja arrested him at Ogere, a town along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway that has become a notable transit point for travellers and traders moving between Nigeria’s commercial capital and the rest of the country. His arrest and subsequent repatriation were presented by the police as a demonstration of Nigeria’s willingness to cooperate with international partners in tracking fugitives and combating transnational organised crime.
The Inspector-General of Police, Olatunji Rilwan Disu, reaffirmed the Force’s commitment to strengthening international police cooperation and maximising INTERPOL tools and capabilities to track fugitives. He said the Nigeria Police Force would continue to work with INTERPOL and other international law enforcement agencies to disrupt cross-border criminal networks and prevent Nigeria from becoming a safe haven for persons wanted for criminal offences in other countries. The statement from the police was terse and factual, offering no details about how Zhang entered Nigeria, how long he had been in the country, whether he had any local accomplices, or whether Nigerian authorities had opened their own investigation into his activities while he was resident in Ogun State. Those questions remain unanswered.
The case is the latest in a series of repatriations of Chinese fugitives by the Nigeria Police Force through INTERPOL NCB Abuja in 2026. In May, the Force arrested and repatriated Xu Qing, a Chinese national wanted over his alleged involvement in a 245 million dollar Ponzi scheme. He was arrested on April 24, 2026, and repatriated to China on April 28, 2026. In July, the Force arrested and repatriated Cai Jinlian, a wildlife trafficker wanted for smuggling approximately 12 tonnes of tree pangolin scales from Nigeria into China in two consignments between November 2018 and April 2019. His two accomplices had been convicted and sentenced to over 14 years’ imprisonment by a Chinese court in December 2020. Cai fled China to Egypt in July 2019, later relocated to Nigeria around 2023, moving between Delta and Plateau States, and was arrested in Abuja on July 18, 2026, before being repatriated to Shanghai on July 29, 2026. The pattern suggests a sustained effort by Nigerian authorities to respond to Chinese extradition requests, particularly in cases involving wildlife trafficking and financial crime.
The rosewood trade that Zhang is accused of facilitating has been a significant and damaging phenomenon in West Africa for more than a decade. Driven almost entirely by demand from China for Hongmu, a high-end furniture wood, rosewood became the world’s most trafficked illegal wildlife product in terms of both value and volume, surpassing ivory and rhinoceros horn combined. Between 2014 and 2018, Nigeria underwent a seismic shift in its forestry sector, transforming from a minor timber participant into the world’s largest exporter of African rosewood, known locally as Kosso. At the peak of the boom in 2017, Nigeria accounted for approximately 58 per cent of all West African rosewood exports to China. According to the Environmental Investigation Agency, more than 1.4 million rosewood logs were laundered through Chinese ports, enough to fill an estimated 10,000 shipping containers. The scale of the trade was particularly intense between January 2014 and June 2017, when an average of over 40 containers of rosewood logs left Nigeria for China each day, translating to roughly 5,600 logs daily, equivalent to about 2,800 trees harvested every 24 hours. To legalise these logs, which were worth an estimated 300 million dollars, thousands of permits under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species were allegedly signed retroactively by Nigerian officials, bypassing international conservation laws.
Kosso is not an ordinary forest tree. It is a dense, slow-growing hardwood that can take up to 120 years to mature. It plays a structural role in forest composition, contributes to soil stability and carbon sequestration, and provides shade and habitat for birds, insects and small mammals. Unlike fast-growing plantation species, Kosso cannot regenerate quickly after large-scale extraction. It requires specific forest conditions to thrive, including stable soil systems and the presence of mature, seed-bearing trees that enable natural regeneration. When these older trees are removed indiscriminately, the reproductive cycle is disrupted. Younger trees, even if present, cannot compensate for the ecological role of mature stands. A harvested Kosso tree represents decades of growth lost in a single act of logging. In November 2018, CITES suspended rosewood exports from Nigeria, citing concerns over widespread overharvesting and the ecological impact of unregulated trade. While the ban officially halted legal exports, wildcat logging has continued at an alarming pace across the country’s forests, from Oyo and Ogun to Taraba and Cross River states.
The repatriation of Zhang Shijie is a victory for bilateral police cooperation, but it also raises uncomfortable questions about Nigeria’s own enforcement capacity. If a fugitive wanted for smuggling 1,400 tonnes of endangered rosewood could live in Ogun State for years without being detected, how many others are doing the same? The Nigeria Police Force has demonstrated its willingness to act on INTERPOL requests, but the underlying trade that made Zhang’s alleged crimes possible continues. The forests of Ogun, Oyo, Taraba and Cross River are still being stripped. The demand in China remains strong. The networks that move the timber from Nigerian forests to Chinese ports remain largely intact. The police have said they will continue to work with international partners to disrupt cross-border criminal networks. For now, one fugitive has been sent home. The larger fight, against the trade that enriched him, is far from over.
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