KENYA RIVALS COLUMBIA (sic) IN DRUG TRAFFICKING

NAIROBI (AANA) January 11 - Kenya's drug problem has been compared to that
of Columbia as large forest lands are cleared and planted with bhang
(canabis sativa) while the plantations are protected by guards armed with
bows and arrows.

Vast areas of Mount Kenya Forest and other parts of the country have been
cleared and planted with bhang bushes while government officers are
restricted from approaching the plantations, says Kenya's former vice
president for a decade, Mwai Kibaki, who is now leader of official
opposition leader in Parliament and heads the Democratic Party of Kenya.

Kibaki's alarm bells were sounded soon after the head of the Anglican
Church in Kenya, Dr. David Gitari, disclosed that the former Commissioner
of Police, Shadrack Kiruki, a 'born-again' Christian, had been hounded out
of office by drug barons because he had refused to play ball and was
threatening to put them out of business.

Kiruki had reportedly been relieved of his job late in 1996 for failure to
control policemen who had at one time emptied their magazines into
demonstrating Kenyatta University students, killing two instantly and
injuring hundreds others.

The students had been demonstrating against the killing of another student
by police at the Egerton University campus in Njoro. The dozen policemen
charged with the shooting of the students at Kenyatta University were later
acquitted by the court.

Experts say that a complete generation has been destroyed by drugs while
traffickers have targeted schools where widespread bhang smoking is now a
serious issue.

Nevertheless following the protests by Gitari and Kibaki, police have
embarked on some half-hearted efforts to combat the menace. Large bhang
plantations across the country have been invaded, the plants uprooted and
destroyed while the growers arrested and charged in court.

Apart from being a major grower of bhang, Kenya has become a major staging
point for traffickers while domestic consumption has escalated in recent
times, according to an International Narcotics Control Strategy report.

Between April and November 1998, eighty-seven acres of bhang were destroyed
and another ten that had re-grown cleared. At the same time forest guards
and police have been put on red alert while the Kenya Police High Command
have conceded that maintaining surveillance on the vast mount Kenya forest
is most difficult.

The Central Provincial Police Officer, James Munyua, under whose
jurisdiction Mount Kenya falls, conceded that there is widespread bhang
cultivation in the area but arrested suspects have refused to talk. The
cultivation is undertaken to meet both domestic and export demand.

A large quantity of bhang with street value estimated at Sh. 600m. was
intercepted at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport early last year while
another haul with a street value of Sh. 100m. was intercepted at Lamu, in
the Coast Province where in 1996 the largest haul so far, a 20 tonnes haul
of hashish with street value of Sh. 2bn. was intercepted in Kwale. Other
contraband has been seized in many parts of the country.

The money to be made in drug trafficking is too alluring and worth taking
the risk while the traffickers themselves too offer good money for the
security officers to look the other side.

On October 20, 1998, policemen from Ramisi Police Station at the Coast
intercepted a vehicle transporting 160 cartons out of which only 20
contained Winston cigarettes.

The rest was hashish. The contraband had been off-loaded by a freighter
docked on the notorious Bodo creek, not a designated entry or customs point.

The suspect was arrested and taken to the Mswambweni Police Station where
he was made to record a statement and was later charged with drug
trafficking and being in possession of uncustomed goods.

Before he was produced in court he was released together with the vehicle
and contraband and disappeared. The police later explained that the owners
of the goods produced documents proving that they had paid customs duty on
them. How customs duty could be paid on hashish has left most Kenyans
flabbergasted. The truth is that the owner paid the police handsomely.

The problem with Kenya and indeed Tanzania is that they are vulnerable to
trafficking by their geographical positions which include long coastlines
which are difficult to police, coupled by direct flights that make
stopovers in the local airports.

The US State Department has also expressed concern about the drugs menace
in Kenya and attributed it to chronic corruption in the public sector which
has been the biggest impediment in the fight against trafficking and indeed
contributed to withdrawal of donor aid to Kenya. Kenya has, nonetheless,
established a high powered inter-ministerial committee at the State Law
Offices under the chairmanship of the Solicitor-General, Justice Aaron
Ringera, to combat the menace.

But despite tough measures, Kenya has been a major transit point for drug
traffickers with some of the largest hauls intercepted in Europe having at
one time or other passed through East Africa and Kenyan ports particularly.

The drug menace is not confined to Kenya but is a problem for most of the
continent. Seizures of cannabis resin at Rotterdam (10, 370 kgs) in April
1994 and Montreal (26,430 kgs and 4,127 kg in May and November 1994
respectively) had exited from Zambia, Mozambique and Uganda but originally
came from Pakistan. This strongly suggested that traffickers were targeting
eastern and southern Africa ports for cannabis resin originating from
Pakistan and destined for North America and Europe.

The largest seizures of 90.76 kg and 69.56 kg of cocaine had been made in
Nigeria and South Africa respectively in 1994.

While South Africa accounts for the bulk of seizures of cannabis sativa in
Africa, Morocco recorded the largest seizures of 36 tonnes of cannabis
resin seized in January 1996.

In West Africa, trafficking in pemoline and ephedrine continues unabated.
In recent years chlordiazepoxide, diaepan and phenobarbital have also
appeared in the traffic to Africa notably in Kenya, Angola, Benin, Liberia,
Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

Recent discussions on drug control at sub-regional economic community
meetings as well as Council of Ministers of the OAU have focused greater
attention to drug control in Africa.

The adoption at the 32nd ordinary session of the OAU Assembly of Heads of
States and Government in July 1996 and the Declaration and Plan of Action
on Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking in Africa gave the impetus to the
drug control activities in the continent and offered the greatest
demonstration of the will of African countries to effectively control drug
trafficking and abuse.

Consequently in February last year the East African Criminal Investigation
Department (CID) directors, Noah Arap Too (Kenya), Chris Bakiza (Uganda)
and Rajab Adadi (Tanzania) held a two day meeting and resolved among other
things to exchange information, intelligence and co-operate in circulating
"wanted" arrests and repatriation of suspects. Their efforts will need much
cooperation if they will succeed in ending this deadly menace.