Drug labs found across Southern and East Africa as police warn the region is now a manufacturing base
Seized drug quantities and dismantled clandestine laboratories point to a region that is no longer only a transit route, according to reporting by eNCA (YouTube).
Makeshift laboratories are being uncovered, drugs seized and suspects arrested across Southern and East Africa, and police in the region are worried the territory is no longer only a transit route for illicit drugs but is becoming a manufacturing base as well.
That assessment, reported by eNCA (YouTube), rests on the quantities of drugs seized and the clandestine laboratories dismantled across the region. Of particular concern in the reporting is evidence that the region is not only a transit and consumer market but may increasingly be developing into a source of illicit drug production and supply.
The findings have pushed the question of cross-border enforcement to the front of the regional agenda. Porous borders and gaps in cross-border enforcement remain a problem, and one official quoted in the eNCA report said member states are being used by criminal networks for trafficking and other organised crime.
“Many of the member states here we have porous borders and these criminals have been using those porous borders to to drop traffic and to do other organized crimes,” the official said. “I think it is the high time we embrace digital system on our border points.” The same official pointed to the United States border with Mexico, which he said has been digitalised, and argued that the region needs to do the same to contain the problem.
The trilateral planning cell, which now includes Angola and Uganda, is looking to strengthen regional coordination and intelligence sharing. Among the issues under consideration is the establishment in South Africa of a multidisciplinary hub to deal with organised crime and to share information.
“We are hoping that the participating countries will use that hub um to share information um and to and for their personnel to participate directly in the work of the hub,” an official said in the eNCA report.
What remains untested is whether the proposed centre moves beyond promises to concrete action. With the region increasingly described as a manufacturing base for illicit drugs, the measure of the plan will be whether intelligence sharing translates into joint operations and the dismantling of criminal networks. The eNCA report is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf1Bs76eUkU.
