FIVE YEARS AFTER AKASHA DEATH, 'MAMA MAFIA' TRYING TO RIVAL HIM

Nairobi -- Ibrahim Akasha is perhaps the biggest name to come out of
Mombasa as an international drug dealer.

Five years after his death, new drug lords said to be handling a narcotic
load that makes Mombasa probably the most drugged town in Kenya are
following his footsteps.

And one of the major ones in the coastal town is a Tanzanian woman who
lives in a palatial, heavily fortified house in Likoni.

Even the police dread her name, yet few people really know the shadowy
figure operating in the underworld.

Police sources said she is best known by several nicknames, Mama Mafia,
Bawazir or Mama TZ.

Mama Mafia lives in a beautiful house in Likoni, surrounded by stone wall
fence with a solid iron gate.

Police sources describe her as a mysterious woman because she is rarely
seen during day time.

She drives posh four-wheel drive cars and sleek limousines with tinted
windows. She rarely leaves her house but police say she has young girls and
boys she sends to do her illicit business.

Her massive supply of drugs is said to come from Tanzania, smuggled into
Kenya by a Kenyan drug dealer nicknamed as Waziri.

Waziri has a house behind a secondary school in the island. He is the main
hard drug smuggler for not just 'Mama Mafia' but also other barons.

According to police, he smuggles heroin and cocaine from Tanzania through
Likoni-Lunga Lunga road.

Police sources said Waziri recently shifted base to Likoni from Kisauni,
where residents who accused him of drug-running flushed him out.

The drugs are ferried by Tanzanian buses if the road is favourable (police
checks), and through panya (short-cuts) routes when things are not good.

Waziri is also said to have a local network of bhang originating from
Uganda through Busia via Kisumu, then to Mombasa.

Some of the bhang comes from Tanzania through Isebania-Migori border and to
Mombasa, according to police.

It is often ferried in the boots of saloon cars to beat checks by police.

Waziri, like Mama Mafia, is also very rich and police sources say he is
known to be dealing in drugs in a big way but somehow has never been arrested.

Law abiding neighbours of Mama Mafia in Likoni spoke of their frustrations
in their efforts to report the drug baron to police. She somehow never gets
arrested, despite police cars frequenting her house.

"We have tipped off police several times on her activities but the
officers, of all ranks, are in her pocket, otherwise how come she never
gets arrested?" wonders a Likoni resident.

But police sources say she has been arrested severally but has always
managed to get her way out. Indeed, she was taken court sometimes back but
was never convicted, same as Waziri.

A drug peddler in the Old Town who knows her says she is a proud woman who
talks to people, through a heavily grilled window.

Several bouncers keep everyone without an appointment out of the house.
Most appointments are with her major drug suppliers who go there to collect
their consignment. Police say most of the drugs arriving in Mombasa are
orders for Mama Mafia, who then re-supplies the island and its environs.

Police sources say there are several other rich drug barons in the town who
operate independently of Mama Mafia, but for now she appears to the largest
dealer.

She cannot possibly surpass Akasha, whose business spanned several
countries and continents and who at one time was said to have brought a
full container of drugs through the Port of Mombasa. But as far as drugs
supply is concerned, Mama Mafia is said to be flooding the town with as
much narcotics as the late drug baron.

Police sources say the reason she is not arrested is that she is
well-connected with the police.

Even when raids are ordered, sources say nothing is found because she is
warned by her police connections in advance and has time to tidy everything up.

Many Likoni youths who are in the drugs business are said to be ready to
defend her as she pays them well.

Some people who have crossed the path of Mama Mafia's network have met her
full wrath.

A retired military major told of how he was beaten up by bouncers allied to
the woman after he reported to police another woman who lives in Kaloleni
and who supplies drugs to Mama Mafia.

The former soldier was forced to move his business premises from Kaloleni
when he asked why the woman had not been prosecuted.

Police, who harassed him, also raided his house and shop claiming he was
dealing in drugs.