Pubdate: Wed, 26 May 2004
Source: Namibian, The (Namibia)
Copyright: 2004 The Namibian.
Contact:  http://www.namibian.com.na/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2904
Author: Werner Menges

RECORD SEIZURE OF COCAINE AT AIRPORT

Windhoek

THREE Angolan women are in Police custody in Windhoek after they were
arrested at the Hosea Kutako International Airport on Monday, allegedly with
a record quantity of cocaine hidden in the luggage of one of them.

The Unit Commander of the Namibian Police's Drug Law Enforcement Unit,
Detective Inspector Barry de Klerk, said yesterday that his unit was still
investigating whether two of the women who had been arrested could be linked
to a suspected drug-smuggling syndicate of which the third woman may have
been part.

De Klerk said the arrest of the three women resulted from a routine luggage
search by customs officers at the airport.

That search ended in the largest quantity of cocaine ever to have been found
in Namibia on a single occasion, being discovered in three suitcases that
one of the women, aged 22, had with her, he said.

About 21 kilograms of the drug, valued at some N$9.45 million at the
current, general street price of N$450 a gram that is paid for cocaine in
Namibia, was discovered hidden in 112 packages of new shirts in the three
suitcases, De Klerk explained.

He added that the cocaine was found hidden inside carton shirt stiffeners -
the rectangular piece of cardboard normally put inside folded new shirts in
order to keep the garments' shape.

The woman in whose luggage the shirts were found had arrived at the airport
on a flight from Johannesburg.

Her journey to Namibia had however started in Sao Paulo, Brazil, from where
she had flown to Johannesburg, De Klerk said.

The three arrested women - the 22-year-old prime suspect and women aged 33
and 50 respectively - are thought to have travelled together, and were all
transporting new shirts in their luggage with them, he added.

He said the 22-year-old woman was claiming that she had bought the shirts in
Brazil with the aim of taking it to Angola to resell it.

She also claimed that she was planning to buy a flight ticket to Angola in
Namibia; she did not yet have such a ticket, De Klerk related.

The suspects are expected to appear in the Windhoek Magistrate's Court
today.

The 21kg of cocaine that was seized on Monday eclipses the previous largest
quantity of the drug to have been found with suspected drug smugglers in
Namibia.

The previous record was set in August 1997, when 17.5 g of cocaine was found
hidden in electrical transformers that two men, one a Cameroonian, the other
from Nigeria, had in their luggage in Windhoek as they were about to board a
bus bound for South Africa.

Those two suspects went on to be convicted of dealing in cocaine, and in
February 1999 each was sentenced to ten years imprisonment.
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