Maputo — Mozambique's Central Office for the Fight against Organised and Transnational Crime (GCCCOT) on Friday announced an offensive against a drug trafficking ring, including Mozambican, Nigerian and Mexican citizens, who had been smuggling illicit drugs into the country via Maputo International Airport.
A GCCCOT release says that a key figure in the ring was a Mozambican woman who was arrested on 2 May. She had been facilitating the entry of foreign traffickers into the country, in coordination with some Nigerians and with officials responsible for issuing Mozambican entry visas.
This woman (whose name was not revealed) had clearly been under GCCCOT surveillance for some time. The release includes a photo of the woman (with her face blacked out) receiving Mexican citizens at the airport.
The GCCCOT investigations led to the discovery of a drug producing factory, operated by Nigerians and Mexicans, in Vundica locality, Moamba district, about 60 kilometres north of Maputo. The entry of these Mexicans and Nigerians (who are currently on the run) had been facilitated by the unnamed Mozambican woman.
The GCCCOT release contains photos of the drug factory, but does not state what drugs were being produced. (In previous cases, the main drug produced was mandrax, for which there is a ready market in South Africa).
Alongside the drugs factory, the same foreign citizens were running a farm which grew vegetables. The GCCCOT believes the farm was a means of disguising the illicit origin of the group's funds.
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At the farm, the authorities seized two warehouses, five other buildings, five heavy goods vehicles, seven mechanical diggers, four four-wheeled motorcycles, eight tractors, and a variety of other agricultural equipment.
One of the Nigerian citizens involved (who has also not yet been named) has a criminal record in Brazil. Because of his drug trafficking activities and use of false documents, he was expelled from Brazil in 2012.
As part of the same investigations, two Mozambican citizens were detained on 19 June in possession of 446 boxes containing 90.8 kilos of cocaine, disguised as roll-on deodorants.
On Thursday (27 June) a further 120 boxes were seized, each of which contained 12 units of cocaine, weighing 1.4 kilos, and disguised as sweets (lollipops).
The fake sweets had arrived at Maputo airport on 19 June, and staff at the Cargo Terminal facilitated the removal of the drugs. The GCCCOT release does not state whether any airport staff have been detained.
Connected with this trafficking ring are some cases that have already come to trial, including one from last year in which a citizen from Ivory Coast was sentenced to 16 years imprisonment for drug trafficking.
The GCCCOT pledged that it will continue to battle against organized crime, particularly drug trafficking and money laundering, and called for "a strengthening of the internal control mechanisms in public and private institutions, in the fight against this evil'.
