This project is funded
by the European Union
Issue 04 | June 2018
The heroin coast
A political economy along the eastern
African seaboard
Simone Haysom, Peter Gastrow and Mark Shaw
Summary
In recent years, the volume of heroin shipped from Afghanistan along a network of maritime
routes in East and southern Africa appears to have increased considerably. Most of this heroin is
destined for Western markets, but there is a spin-off trade for local consumption. An integrated
regional criminal market has developed, both shaping and shaped by political developments in the
region. Africa is now experiencing the sharpest increase in heroin use worldwide and a spectrum
of criminal networks and political elites in East and southern Africa are substantially enmeshed in
the trade. This report focuses on the characteristics of the heroin trade in the region and how it has
become embedded in the societies along this route. It also highlights the features of the criminalgovernance
systems that facilitate drug trafficking along this coastal route.
Recommendations
• The East African heroin market forms an integrated regional criminal
economy based on the transit of heroin from Afghanistan to the West.
• The transit economy relies on international ports and other
infrastructure, and high levels of political protection.
• There is a rapidly growing consumer drug market in the region – one
that is much larger than is commonly acknowledged.
• Despite some positive trends in drug users’ ability to access health
services in several locations in the region, there are nevertheless gaps
RESEARCH PAPER
in appropriate drug treatment interventions.
This paper focuses on:
2 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Executive summary
Since 2010, several large heroin seizures by the
Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) – a 32-memberstate
naval partnership that conducts maritime
security operations aimed at countering terrorism and
narcotics smuggling – have confirmed that the eastern
African coast is playing a significant role in the global
heroin trade.1
Heroin is being shipped from Afghanistan to the east
coast of Africa along a maritime route known as the
‘southern route’. This is in reality a network of routes
stretching along East and southern Africa, with drug
consignments eventually making their way to countries
in Asia, Africa, Europe and, to a limited extent, North
America. The southern route has gained popularity
because the land-based Balkan trafficking route to
Western Europe is increasingly difficult for traffickers to
use owing to conflict and increased law enforcement
there.2 This has meant that illegal drug flows are
diverted by sea to East Africa – and these movements
are considerably harder to police. The volume of trade
along this route appears to be increasing.
Much of the focus has hitherto been on how heroin
shipped along the southern route reaches Europe.
However this perspective tends to downplay or even
ignore the impact of the trade on transit countries
in Africa. Therefore, the focus of this study is on the
characteristics of the heroin trade in the region and
how the narcotics trade has become embedded in the
societies along the southern route.
This report is the culmination of four months of
qualitative research based on over 240 interviews
conducted in seven countries. This research raises several
concerning issues.
In countries all along the eastern seaboard of Africa,
from Kismayo to Cape Town, the heroin trade has
become embedded in local communities and linked
to political elites, where it has taken advantage of the
weak checks and balances on political actors and
state institutions. The East African heroin market is
best understood as forming an integrated regional
criminal economy based on the transit of heroin from
Afghanistan to the West, and with a spin-off trade for
local consumption.
Along this trafficking route, much of the heroin is first
shipped to Africa on motorised, wooden seagoing
dhows built in the United Arab Emirates. The vessels
are loaded with between 100 kg and 1 000 kg
consignments of contraband off the Makran coast of
southern Pakistan. The dhows anchor off the coast of
Africa in international waters, and flotillas of small boats
collect the heroin and ferry it to various beaches, coves
or islands, or offload it into small commercial harbours.
The research reveals that dozens of such sites are used
for landing the consignments along the entire eastern
coastline – from north of Kismayo, Somalia, to Angoche,
Mozambique. This route is used all year round apart
from during the three-month monsoon period.
The East African heroin
market is best understood as
forming an integrated regional
criminal economy
Significantly, the research also suggests that transit
traffickers have made use of containers at various deepwater
container ports along the coast, and that several
ports have fallen under substantial criminal influence
and are used to transship a number of other illicit goods,
such as elephant ivory and timber.
Most of the heroin that passes through East and
southern Africa is destined for markets in Europe, which
are far more profitable than the African markets.3 The
transit heroin trade is a bulk trade: though shipments
are sometimes broken down into smaller consignments
in an effort to avoid detection, much heroin transported
this way is moved in units of tens or even hundreds
of kilograms at a time. As such, the transit economy
relies on international ports and highways, and, to a
lesser extent, air links. The trade also relies on high-level
political protection, so that those involved can benefit
from ready access to infrastructure, such as ports along
the route, which are ostensibly important to national
security and so should be well guarded and controlled
by governments.
Initially, the political protection secured for this trade
seems to have emerged out of simple transactions
between drug traffickers and political figures who
exert control over ports, customs and law-enforcement
agencies. Heroin traders using this transit route need
to arrange for these ports to be permeable, and
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 3
ensure their illicit goods are neither seized nor linked
to criminal cases against them. Over time, these
transactions have evolved in different ways along the
coast. This study highlights the particular features of
these criminal-governance systems as they occur along
this coastal trafficking route:
• In Kenya, which one could characterise as a market
where there is ‘multipolar competition’, drug
traffickers have either campaigned directly for
political office or they are often linked to political
interests. Here, no single group dominates and there is
significant competition among a spectrum of players.
• Tanzania is currently going through a series of reforms
under President Magufuli that are substantially
transforming criminal-political relationships in the
country, with signs that this is having the effect
of displacing criminal figures to other parts of the
region. Tanzania can be labelled as a ‘disrupted
criminal market’.
• In Mozambique, drug traffickers have consolidated
their hold over the market in a remarkably resilient
and long-standing quid pro quo with elements linked
to the political elite. The authors argue therefore
that Mozambique can be regarded as a relatively
consolidated criminal market where ‘taxing’ the
proceeds from heroin may have contributed to
funding political party campaigns and reinforced local
patronage networks. There is also evidence that a
period of further evolution in the market may now be
under way.
• In South Africa heroin has not been directly linked to
political figures, although prominent figures in the
broader drug trade have. Here, however, most notably
in the Western Cape and in Gauteng, powerful,
and often violent, criminal interests are involved in
controlling the heroin trade on the street.
Not all heroin is in transit along this route, however.
East and southern Africa have a much larger consumer
market than is commonly acknowledged. This
consumer market gets some of its supply from ‘leakage’
from the transit trade – through in-kind payments to
drivers, fishermen, police officers, etc. – and through
small-scale theft from bulk consignments. But there
is also some indication that bigger players arrange
their own supplies directly from Pakistan or from
the kingpins of the transit trade. In South Africa, in
particular, the consumer market for heroin is large
and growing, and this phenomenon is being driven
by organised local and international networks. In this
study, we refer to this as the secondary heroin trade or
secondary heroin economy.
South Africa, in fact, stands out as major destination for
much of the heroin that enters the region, both as an
end destination for local sale and consumption, and
for onward shipping because traffickers appear to have
greater ease getting containers from South Africa to
Europe. (The researchers were told that this is because
of a combination of the fact that freight leaving South
Africa is considered to be at lower risk of containing
contraband, and because there is a large volume of
licit trade between South Africa and Europe.) There is
also evidence, however, that heroin is making its way
westwards across the continent by land through Uganda
and onwards to West Africa, though these routes fall
outside the scope of this report.
The 2017 World drug report
noted that Africa is currently
experiencing the sharpest
increase in heroin use globally
The 2017 World drug report noted that Africa is currently
experiencing the sharpest increase in heroin use
globally, and this has been attributed to Africa’s role in
the southern route.4 According to various sources across
the region (see Table 2), In Kenya there are almost 55
000 people who inject heroin (the consumption method
that carries the highest health risks associated with
this drug), over 32 000 in Tanzania and over 75 000
in South Africa. But the numbers of people smoking
heroin, which, for many, will lead to injecting later, are
much higher. In most of these countries, the rates of HIV
among people who inject drugs (PWID) are several times
higher than those among the rest of the population, and
there are astronomically high rates of hepatitis C in this
group.5 Despite a heartening trend that is seeing drug
users’ rights and their access to health services being
placed at the centre of drug treatment approaches
in several locations, there are nevertheless gaps in
such interventions.
Cities with the biggest consumer markets – like
Mombasa, Cape Town and the Johannesburg–Pretoria
metropolitan area – are also beset with violence
associated with the drug trade. For example, residents
4 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
in Mombasa say that local gangs that give protection
to heroin barons have mushroomed over the last few
years. At the same time, and in the midst of widespread
impunity for the people who organise and profit from
the drug trade, lynching of drug users by anti-crime
vigilante groups has also become commonplace.
In South Africa, nyaope and unga use has also led to
an increase in crime, with addicts financing their habit
by resorting to mugging, theft of electrical copper
cables and other criminal activities.6 More significantly,
however, in gang-controlled areas levels of violence have
seen huge increases, related both to an influx of guns7
and dramatic gang wars over drug turf. The Cape Town
murder rate spiralled upwards from around 2011 and
has only recently stabilised – albeit at extremely high
levels – making the city one of the most violent in the
world, on a par with several Latin American capitals.8
The heroin trade is therefore linked, both directly and
indirectly, to a number of serious developments in
the East and southern African region. These include
sustaining undemocratic political figures and parties,
the role of the trade in making key ports porous, the
empty hotels and undeveloped land that serve as fronts
for laundering drug money, the spread of HIV and
hepatitis C, and violence in the communities caught up
in heroin consumer markets.
A separate policy brief accompanying this study9 puts
forward a number of recommendations, cautions and
ideas on how best to respond to the heroin trade in
southern and East Africa.10 The regional integration of
the heroin trade raises several critical challenges for
both civil-society and law-enforcement responses. There
are also, however, important opportunities for action
that can be taken now.
Background
Since 2010, when a series of large seizures drew
attention to the long-standing heroin trade transiting
the eastern coast of Africa, there has been a growing
debate about the nature and implications of this
criminal economy. The discussion to date, however, has
been fragmentary, and heavily reliant on seizure data
and on small ad hoc user surveys from which to draw
conclusions. As such, attention has focused on the trade
itself and failed to capture its broader impact.
Given that these seizures indicate a long chain of
criminal activity along the coast, it makes sense to
consider the trade in the region as a whole and to trace
its evolution over several decades. This is the motivation
for this study.
The heroin trade plays a significant role in local
and national politics in countries along the eastern
seaboard of Africa. As mentioned, it is best understood
as forming an integrated regional criminal economy,
based around the transit of heroin from Afghanistan
to Europe, and a spin-off trade for local consumption.
Political systems across the region show signs of
having been significantly captured for criminal ends.
Heroin use is growing, while public-health systems are
generally struggling to respond to it effectively or with
the necessary capacity. The side effects of this trade
are damaging to democracy and the prospects for
broad-based economic development. Furthermore, in
communities where there is widespread use there is
much higher risk of HIV and hepatitis C infection, and
these communities are wracked by violence associated
with the drug trade.
The heroin trade plays a
significant role in local and
national politics in countries
along the eastern seaboard
of Africa
This report sets out how the heroin trade operates along
a section of the southern route and major routes into
and through East and southern Africa. It then turns to
how the trade developed, the networks involved and
their relationship to political figures, political parties
and political finance in the region. It then sets out the
major implications of these findings, with a focus on
the impact of the trade on democratic institutions, local
economies, drug use and dependency, and violence.
The report concludes with a call for serious policy
discussion about how best to respond to the heroin
trade. When the trade is disrupted in one country, it
appears that it is merely displaced to another, and
the trade itself is not diminished. Hence, the regional
integration of the heroin trade raises several critical
challenges for both civil-society and law-enforcement
responses.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 5
Methodology
Researching illicit activities is a challenge in any
context: those who engage in illegal economic and
other activities have strong incentives that their
work is not reported on and thus goes unhindered.11
Nevertheless, it is widely accepted that researching
organised criminal and illicit activities is possible, and
indeed is a necessary step, to present information
in a strategic and accessible way for practitioners,
policymakers, civil society, journalists, academic
specialists and the general public.12 There is growing
consensus that not enough research on illicit
economies has been done, with the result that the
motivations of many actors are not well understood
and that this is essential for a fuller understanding
of developments in all societies in the context of the
rapid globalisation of crime.13
Research work in the area generally follows a
triangulation of several approaches. Interviews
with people in and around the illicit economy in
question are critical. Much information can be
obtained by speaking to protagonists and observers,
not necessarily on individual cases, but how the
system or political economy operates. Research
that entails speaking only with law-enforcement
authorities is generally accepted to be too skewed
to one perspective and is therefore not regarded
as providing an accurate assessment on its own.14
Retired officials, people who are in contact with
criminal operators, as well as informed journalists,
civil-society actors and others are all crucial sources.
Multiple interviews are essential, and interviews
conducted with a spectrum of different people,
including locals with good knowledge of the
environment in question, are particularly useful if one
is to ensure an accurate picture is obtained. Interview
material can be collaborated with published
sources, such as newspaper articles, court records,
government papers, reports from foreign actors
and other documentation. Secondary literature also
provides a useful means to contextualise historical
developments and understand the motivations of
various actors.
An important point to make about researching illicit
economies is that the output is less about individual
cases than providing a strategic picture of what is
under way. Therefore, the focus is on trends, the
contours of the political economy, the incentives
of different actors, the nature of geographic hubs
for criminal economies and the reasons for this
concentration, and the like. With some exceptions,
the objective of research is to paint a clear picture
of the political economy of an illicit activity, so that
reporting on individual cases (arrests, seizures, etc.)
is contextualised, but also so that a series of policy
alternatives can be debated.
Following the overall approach described in the box
above, six local researchers were commissioned to
conduct research in the countries along the coast and
in Uganda. These researchers were able to visit major
cities and ports, small towns and villages, remote
coastal areas and urban slums in an unobtrusive way
and with their senses attuned to local sensitivities.
Discretion was important both for their safety and that
of their sources. They drew on their existing network
and forged new connections with sources close to
criminal trades. The researchers conducted semistructured
interviews on the ground between July and
August 2017, and submitted field reports based on
their findings.
An external expert team from the Global Initiative
against Transnational Organized Crime then visited
several town and cities in the same areas in September
2017, verifying and triangulating information with
previously consulted sources. They also conducted
new interviews. The expert team assessed the work of
the local researchers and followed up with a number
of interlocutors.
The people selected to be interviewed for this study
were retired and current customs officials; former and
serving police officers; people involved in the maritime
trade; drug rehabilitation workers; drug users; journalists
and academics; practising and retired lawyers and
judges; employees of suspected drug traffickers;
port authorities; local religious figures; private-sector
informants; politicians; and convicted and imprisoned
drug traffickers. Indirectly, the team was also able to
gather information from petty drug dealers, stowaways
and seamen plying the Indian Ocean trade.
Some 240 people were interviewed in the course of
the research by the local researchers and the expert
team. In addition to fieldwork in Kenya, Tanzania,
Mozambique, South Africa and Uganda,15 interviews
were conducted in the Seychelles and Pakistan. (Please
refer to the annexe at the end of this report for a more
granular breakdown of the interviews by location and
participant occupation.)
6 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
In addition to drawing on these interviews with people
in, or close to, the illicit trade, the Global Initiative
commissioned further research on specific issues and
regions that needed discrete consideration. Field reports
were also supplemented with a review of relevant local
news articles and the academic literature. Public and
leaked government documents provided corroboration
of several key claims. Our aim was not to act as police
investigators, but rather to recognise the premise that
to build an accurate conceptual framework, one needs
to rely on accessing information that is not in the
public domain.
On 13 and 14 November 2017, a draft of this report was
presented in Nairobi to an expert group comprising
academics, public-health and UN officials, journalists
and other civil-society figures familiar with the issues
presented in the report. They provided informed
critiques and comments, which have been integrated
into the final version. Lastly, the report underwent a nonblind
peer review by researchers in the ENACT network
and experts in the field.
Gaps and challenges in the
research methodology
In order to encourage candour among the participants,
and to protect our sources, the authors have not used
their real names. Many would not have spoken openly
if they were to have been named. Instead, generic
descriptions of interviewees’ professions or roles are
given. Where necessary, locations or other descriptors
that might serve to identify participants have been
changed in anecdotes and examples. The interview
dates are provided in the endnotes.
Our networks were able to turn up more information
in some countries than in others, and the researchers
placed more focus on the areas that are most vulnerable
and particularly understudied. Mozambique, and in
particular its northern region, is very seldom included in
studies, and the authors have paid particular attention
to the situation there, which we believe shows evidence
of criminal capture.
Because of the authors’ long-standing engagement
in researching South Africa’s criminal economy and
their far-reaching networks there, that country is
covered with greater detail and synthesis than some
other parts of the region under study. In Tanzania, for
example, the president’s crackdown on the drugs trade
has created a feeling of huge insecurity for anyone
who has been involved, or could be accused of being
involved, in the drug trade or corruption. The president
is also highly intolerant of criticism, and has shut down
five newspapers since his term of office began. In this
climate, many would-be informants were either too
afraid or too risk-averse to speak openly. The researchers’
ability to access the ‘back story’ to Tanzania’s current
moment was therefore limited by this reticence. The
balance of detail and analysis in the report reflects
these factors.
Many would-be informants
were either too afraid or too
risk-averse to speak openly
It should also be noted that sources, and often the local
researchers, faced significant risks by speaking with
us, from repercussions that might limit their career to
threats of physical harm. We were, nonetheless, able to
interview a large and diverse range of people, most of
whom spoke frankly and openly, including state officials
who are concerned at developments.
Limitations on scope
The southern route encompasses a number of countries
bordering the Indian Ocean, and has linkages to
countries in the interior of Africa. The remit of this study
was to look at the coastal states on the eastern seaboard
on Africa, with a focus on Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique
and South Africa, through which much of the southern
route heroin filters before transit to consumer markets.
In the course of this research, we have also conducted
research on Uganda, commissioned research on South
Sudan and tasked our Kenyan researcher to investigate
the Somali–Kenyan border area. Nonetheless, the
analysis is focused on our original brief, which covers the
four main countries under study.
The authors note that island states in the Indian
Ocean, such as Mauritius and the Seychelles, are also
particularly vulnerable to the heroin trade and its effects.
And although Zimbabwe did not feature as a prominent
transit country in our research, civil-society actors
suggest it is, at best, vulnerable and, at worst, has already
developed a problem with the drug trade. As Zimbabwe
has recently entered a phase of political transition, it is
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 7
likely to experience renewed investment and economic
growth. At the same time, its institutions are highly
compromised or ineffective, so that they will be unable
to keep the illicit economy in check. Our research
suggests this combination is a huge risk factor for the
growth of organised crime. Hence, the island states and
Zimbabwe and Somalia deserve further study.
The role of the southern route in
the heroin trade
As mentioned, since 2010 several large seizures of
heroin by the CMF16 have confirmed that the eastern
African coast is playing a significant role in the global
heroin trade, and the network of routes referred to
here as the southern route has become more popular
for traffickers.
The motorised wooden dhows, in which much of the
heroin is initially shipped along the coast, are between
15 m and 23 m in length, which allows them to travel at
sea but makes them small enough to evade detection
by satellite technology or patrol vessels. The dhows
used for smuggling have concealed compartments,
which can hold 100 kg to 1 000 kg of heroin. After
anchoring 20 km to 100 km off the African coast in
international waters, flotillas of small boats collect the
drug consignments from the dhows and ferry them
to various beaches, coves or islands, or offload them
into small commercial harbours. Our information is
that there are dozens of such landing sites all along
the eastern seaboard, from just north of Kismayo to
Angoche, Mozambique.17
Importantly, interviews we conducted at multiple
locations along the coast suggest that transit traffickers
have also made use of containers at deep-water
ports. Although we do not have seizure data to back
this up, several interviewees shed light on how this is
probably happening.18
Techniques used to smuggle heroin in containers
include stashing drugs in hidden compartments, theft
of whole containers, misdeclaration of end destinations
and tampering with goods at overstay warehouses.
While there are several reports that scanning equipment
has been controlled or sabotaged by powerful traffickers
or political figures at several ports, smuggling heroin
into containers often takes little more than petty
corruption – e.g. bribing a forklift driver, security guard or
clearing agent.
Although traffickers using the southern route have their
own challenges to contend with, such as piracy off
the coast of Somalia and the activities of the CMF, the
volume of trade on this route appears to be increasing.
Previous estimates suggested that 22 to 40 tonnes
of heroin were being trafficked through East Africa
annually,19 and although actual volumes cannot be
ascertained with accuracy, our interviews indicate the
figure may now be higher (this is discussed in more
detail later in the report). The 2017 World drug report
noted that Africa is currently experiencing the sharpest
increase in heroin use globally, and this has been
attributed to the role of the southern route.20
Interviews conducted at
multiple locations along the
coast suggest that transit
traffickers have also made use of
containers at deep-water ports
Much of the attention regarding southern route
has been given to how heroin that transits East and
southern Africa is eventually destined for Europe
(though heroin is also transported to other end markets,
including Asian countries and island states such as
the Seychelles and Mauritius). This is understandable,
as markets in developed countries are the reason for
the existence of this route in the first place, and heroin
use and its impact on society there is important. But
this perspective tends to downplay, or even ignore, the
impact of the heroin trade on the local transit countries.
As such, this report does not focus on uncovering
how heroin enters Europe, or which networks control
this process (although we have uncovered important
information that opens up news lines of inquiry into
these transshipment routes). Instead, the report focuses
on the political economy of the southern route. It looks
more closely at the characteristics of the heroin flows
in the region and how the narcotics trade has become
embedded in the societies along the southern route.
Transit and secondary heroin trade
Most of the heroin that passes through East and
southern Africa is en route to markets in Europe,
which are far more profitable than African markets.
8 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
For example, a gram of heroin costs about US$20
in Kenya, but in the UK it costs about US$60 and in
Denmark US$213.21
As mentioned, the transit heroin trade is a bulk trade
– though shipments are sometimes broken down into
a number of smaller consignments to avoid detection.
As will be explained in more detail below, many of the
major players in the transit trade have been in business
for several decades. In Mozambique and Kenya, for
example, the first major traffickers were ethnically Asian
East Africans who developed links during the 1990s
with drug traffickers operating in both Pakistan and
Europe, though the mechanisms for this are unclear.
In Tanzania a similar process occurred with Zanzibari
actors, who later extended their operations to the
mainland. There is also a presence of European criminal
figures in several locations along the southern route,
including South Africa. These have played a role in
the drugs trade to a greater or lesser extent in various
places for some time.
The growing regional consumer market for heroin gets
some of its supply from ‘leakage’ from the transit trade
– through in-kind payments to drivers, fishermen, the
police, etc. – and through small-scale theft from bulk
consignments. But there is also some indication that
bigger players arrange their own supplies from air mules
travelling from Pakistan, or buy in bulk from transit
traders. We refer to this as the secondary heroin trade.
The secondary trade primarily makes use of roads and
flight routes to ship heroin around the region and within
countries, as well as mules to bring small amounts of
drugs over land borders on foot. The secondary trade
relies mostly on petty corruption among police and
customs officers. The authors believe this trade is more
disorganised, and run by a fluctuating set of players
trading in smaller volumes. Many African criminal
networks are involved in this secondary economy,
including local groups close to consumer markets, and
this, too, is explored in greater detail in the report.
Geography of the southern route heroin
trade: from north to south
Heroin begins its journey through Africa in Afghanistan,
where farmers cultivate the poppy plant over hundreds
of thousands of acres. Opium paste derived from
the poppy seeds is transported to Pakistan, where
it is refined into heroin. (Adulteration takes place at
various points along the route to its most profitable
markets.) During this study, it was learnt that African
drug networks have representatives in the Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan who are involved in
moving heroin shipments to the Balochistan coast.22
There, the heroin is ferried by speedboat and loaded
onto dhows, which have travelled from Iran (where there
is a fuel subsidy), or concealed in containers or in other
boats. The heroin is then shipped to a large number
of locations along the African east coast, which are
described next from north to south.
African drug networks
have representatives in the
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province
of Pakistan
Somalia
The northernmost landing sites are on the 3 700-kmlong
coastline of Somalia, which is under the authority
of a number of military and political groups at different
sites. The researchers learnt that sites in or near Ras
Afun, Eyl, Obbia, El Maan, Brava, Bosaso, Kismayo,
Gobwen, Cape Guardafui, Garowe and Barawa are
used to offload heroin shipments.23 Kismayo is a major
point for consolidation, and then onward shipment,
by road and boat, to Kenya, often together with other
contraband goods that are traded between the two
countries.24 At present, the black-market trade out of
Kismayo (of which the most significant flows are in
sugar, charcoal, counterfeit electronic goods and arms)
is controlled by the Kenya Defence Forces and their
Somali allies, who tax the goods – licit and illicit – that
pass through and have commercial interests in several of
these trades.25
Kenya
Kenya, the region’s economic powerhouse, hosts a
highly dynamic and active matrix of illicit activity.
The scale of criminal activity in Kenya appears to be
partly a result of its greater economic development –
criminal activity is facilitated by the country’s relatively
advanced infrastructure, both for transport and financial
transactions – as well as its proximity to very active
conflict-based criminal economies in the Horn and
central Africa.26
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 9
SOUTH
AFRICA
KENYA
Nairobi
(Inland Container
Depot)
TANZANIA
Dar es Salaam
SOMALIA
Mogadishu
MOZAMBIQUE
Maputo
N
© S Ballard (2017)
Indian
Ocean
Pemba
Nacala
Lamu
Mombasa
Cape Town
Johannesburg
(Tambo International
& City Deep Inland
Container Port)
Durban
Arusha
Angoche
Nampula
Tanga
Stone Town (Zanzibar)
Kismayo
UGANDA
Ras Afun
Cape
Guardafui
Kampala
Capital city
Town
Small port / town
Border Zone
Corridor
km
0 600
ZAMBIA
ZIMBABWE
BOTSWANA
NAMIBIA
Corridor (uncertain)
Dhow routes
Entebbe
Indicative overview of sea- and land-based heroin routes across the eastern African coastal states
Source: Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime, based on interviews across the region, September 2017
10 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Illicit flows traverse Kenya along several routes.27 Apart
from the corridor out of Somalia and across the north
of Kenya, the centre of Kenya provides a conduit for
a wide variety of goods moving from the coast to the
interior. Goods are smuggled along this east–west
corridor into the interior, including electronics, sugar,
rice, motor vehicles, and sometimes arms. Meanwhile,
environmental contraband travels in the opposite
direction through the interior to Mombasa for export.
The interviews suggest that heroin is also trafficked
along this corridor in trucks heading to Uganda via Busia
and Malaba.28 To the south, heroin is smuggled across
the Tanzanian border in both directions, particularly in
the area between Tsavo National Park and the coast.
The story of Ronald Katenda (see below) serves to
illustrate that there are clearly two trafficking routes
out of Kenya – one traversing the continent towards the
west. This route is beyond the scope of this report. The
heroin trafficking route southwards through Tanzania
and beyond appears to be more significant.
Drug running from Mombasa to
Kampala: Ronald’s story29
Ronald Katenda (not his real name), a 33-yearold,
is a graduate in economics from Makerere
University, Kampala. He got involved in the drugs
trade as a courier. In his first mission, he worked for a
‘businessman’ – a Pakistani trafficker whose front was
a business trading tiles in Mombasa. Katenda’s task
was simple – to drive a truck loaded with tiles from
Mombasa to Kampala via Busia. In addition to tiles,
other goods, such as bags of cement, were added to
his load. These contained drugs.
Katenda would drive the truck to a warehouse in
Banda, a suburb of Kampala, and offload the tiles.
There, a group of people with vehicles on standby
would wait to transport the boxes containing the
drugs to other destinations (he was not given any
information about these places). Katenda would
be paid his fee after he had returned to Mombasa.
He was paid US$3 000 dollars for every delivery. He
did three to four deliveries a month; on each trip he
would transport 40 to 50 boxes containing drugs.
Then, one day in 2015, his truck was subjected to
a thorough police check, during which the officers
discovered 46 boxes containing heroin and cocaine,
marked as boxes of tiles. The goods were impounded
by the police at the border town of Busia and
Katenda was arrested. His employer did not answer
his calls but, later, a man arrived at the police station
and negotiated the release of Katenda and the goods
by means of a bribe of 75 million Uganda shillings
in cash (approximately US $22 000). The meeting
that led to the payment was attended by two police
officers and an immigration official.
A few weeks later, Katenda’s courier work shifted to
the route into Tanzania. His payments for transporting
drugs along this route were higher – $4 500 for
every delivery – an increase that reflected the
greater difficulty and risk of operating across the
Tanzanian border.
Katenda started taking drugs and became dependent.
He fell out with his employer, who he claims then tried
to have him killed.
Kenya has two key hubs for the heroin trade. Firstly,
the Port of Mombasa, which is the largest and busiest
seaport in East and central Africa, is a strait through
which goods travelling to and from a combined regional
population of 200 million people in Kenya, Uganda,
Burundi, South Sudan and beyond must flow. One
million containers passed through Mombasa in 2015,30
and the volume of freight transiting the port is growing
significantly. At the same time, however, scanning
capabilities and security resources at the port are limited
and corruption is rampant. There is only one scanner,
which screens a tiny fraction of the export cargo,31
despite official claims that 100% of export goods are
scanned.32 This deficit creates significant loopholes for
traffickers to exploit.
Mombasa is home to several
of Kenya’s most prominent
heroin traffickers
Unsurprisingly, Mombasa is home to several of Kenya’s
most prominent heroin traffickers and is a major node
for heroin imports – and probably also cocaine. Although
figures on the quantities of drugs entering Mombasa
by container are not available, seizures at sea would
indicate that a large amount of heroin arrives at nearby
destinations by dhow, often to be repackaged and
transported onwards from Mombasa, and also at Nairobi.
North and south of Mombasa along the coast are
numerous small landing sites for drug consignments,
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 11
including an ‘ungazetted’ port in Lamu, a small town
that is also a major locus for the drugs trade. There are
other ungazetted ports in Kilifi, Malindi, Mombasa Old
Port, Vanga and Shimoni.33 Although customs officers
are officially assigned to these ports, in practice, as the
Kenya Maritime Authority concedes: ‘These ports are
not subject to international conventions and many
unlicensed boats land there and are never monitored.’34
And besides, there are private jetties along the coast,
especially in Malindi, that serve private residences, which
facilitate smuggling. Small airstrips in Kijipwa, Ukunda,
Lunga Lunga, Voi and Lamu are also used to smuggle
drugs to the coast.35 Furthermore, the 1 420-km Kenyan
coastline has no coast guard.
Secondly, Nairobi, the locus of Kenya’s political power
and densest node of economic activity in the country, is
also a key hub. Many heroin kingpins began their careers
here, because they could take advantage of being able
to rub shoulders with certain political actors and there
were facilities for money laundering. Nairobi has a dry
port36 and lies at the centre of several regional land
transport and rail routes.
Tanzania
Tanzania’s border region with Kenya, particularly
between Kenya’s Tsavo National Park and the coast,
is a hive of smuggling activity. Goods move in both
directions here. In addition to this overland route, heroin
also enters Tanzania’s ports. It is also transported north
overland into Kenya via the Taita, Isebania and Arusha
border points.
Landing sites for the dhow-based heroin trade are found
all along Tanzania’s coast and on Pemba and Unguja
(the islands that make up Zanzibar) and Mafia Island.
Zanzibar Port is said to be key to smugglers looking to
get a broad range of goods into Tanzania and the rest
of East Africa, as well as an exit point for contraband.
(The semi-autonomous Zanzibar37 has historically been
an entrepôt state, and was a major centre of the Indian
Ocean slave trade and the 19th-century ivory trade.)
On the mainland, Dar es Salaam, the largest and most
economically important city, which is set to grow to 10
million inhabitants by 2030. The Port of Dar es Salaam
is an important base for several kingpins in the heroin
trade. Likewise, the deep port of Tanga to the north,
which is home to at least one heroin kingpin (whose
identity is known to the authors), is close to landing sites
in both Tanzania and Kenya.38
Inland, Arusha, which is an international diplomatic
hub39 and major tourism destination (being the main
access point for people climbing Kilimanjaro and
visiting the northern safari circuit), is also a hub for the
heroin market. Due to time constraints, the researchers
were not able to conduct interviews in Arusha, and
we have yet to fully assess the city’s importance in
terms of the regional transport routes. Nevertheless,
Arusha presumably derives its importance in the
coastal criminal economy in part from its proximity to
Nairobi and Mombasa, key Kenyan hubs (it is roughly
equidistant from both cities), and also from its position
on the road corridor south from Kenya.
Landing sites for the dhowbased
heroin trade are found all
along Tanzania’s coast
Road transport corridors are also used to traffic drugs
across the south and centre of Tanzania, through Mbeya,
to Zambia and eventually onwards to South Africa. We
do not have information about the exact route taken
through the interior southwards, but suspect it passes
through Zimbabwe.
Tanzanian networks appear to control, or coordinate,
a large portion of the secondary heroin market in the
region. These operations, which involve transporting
small and medium-sized shipments, have a presence
in Kenya, Mozambique and an increasingly strong
presence in South Africa, where they now play an
important role in fuelling the heroin consumption
market (discussed below). The amount trafficked in one
shipment can be anything from just a few hundred
grams to enough to provide a constant supply to tens
of thousands of users in each of the big metros in
South Africa.
According to one government source in Kenya, who
provided an estimate of the heroin flows, 40 tonnes
transit the whole region annually, while about 5 tonnes
remain in the region.40 An international law-enforcement
source in Tanzania gave a similar estimate of the total
flow through East Africa.41 It is not clear if this volume
includes drugs trafficked through Mozambique, for
which the authors compiled an estimate (based on
information about the frequency of dhow drop-offs) of
between 10 and 40 tonnes a year.
12 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Mozambique
With a large and tightly controlled transit trade,
Mozambique is a conduit for heroin coming from other
transit countries en route to South Africa. The activities
of the transit trade are concentrated in the north of the
country. Mozambique has a large navy, which is active
in border protection but does not seem to take part in
any meaningful counter-smuggling activities, so there
are few checks on smuggling or illegal fishing. In the
words of one corruption watchdog representative, the
Mozambican coastline is ‘a smuggler’s paradise’.42
The fishing boats land
their consignments on the
beaches without attracting
much attention
Heroin is transferred from dhows onto small fishing
boats in the area north of the coastal town of Pemba43
and among the Quirimbas Islands, an archipelago
off the northern coast. The fishing boats land their
consignments on the beaches without attracting much
attention among the numerous other small vessels
plying the area. Others also identified Palma and Ibo as
hotspots.44 Once on land, the heroin is taken by road to
either Nacala or Nampula for consolidation, packaging
and onward shipment.45 Both of these towns are
hubs of the trade. Nacala is the country’s biggest and
most modern port; Nampula is the third largest city in
Mozambique and considered the ‘capital’ of the north.
The other maritime transport method is for heroin to
be hidden in containers imported through (primarily)
Nacala Port – evidence for this is described in greater
detail below. There are no estimates of how much
heroin is imported in this way, however. Also, the
information gathered for this study mainly concerns
the use of key ports to bring drugs in, and not to export
them – though we cannot rule out that exports happen
directly from Nacala. On the other hand, there is a lot
of evidence that most of the heroin in transit through
Mozambique is shipped by road across the country’s
southern border into South Africa.
The transit trade is said to be controlled by a small
number of families of South Asian origin, linked through
marriage and business. Two of them have commercial
concerns in Nampula and Nacala. In Nacala they are said
to have such informal political and economic influence
that they ‘own the town’.46 These networks are discussed
in greater detail below.
There is no verified figure as to how much heroin enters
Mozambique this way. However, several people observing
the trade along the east coast believe that the amount
of heroin entering Mozambique has increased lately as
a result of CMF seizures in the waters near Kenya and
Tanzania, and the crackdown in Tanzania.47 Interviewees
estimate that dhows arrive weekly, except during the
three-month monsoon season, each carrying 200 to
1 000 kilograms of heroin. This would suggest that 10 to
40 tonnes of heroin a year enter Mozambique.48
The secondary trade, and consequently local
consumption, in Mozambique does not appear to be as
significant as in the other countries in the region. Heroin
in the north appears to enter the local market through
leakage from (transit) Mozambican trade, and because it
is brought over the border in small quantities by smalltime
dealers in the secondary trade.
Many of the small-scale dealers of hard drugs in
northern Mozambique are Tanzanian and they have
most likely brought product across the porous northern
Mozambican/southern Tanzanian border zone. These
dealers’ main trade may not be heroin at all – in part
because the local heroin market in Mozambique is
relatively small – and many are involved in selling
cannabis, hashish and other drugs, as well as illicit
gemstones (e.g. gold, rubies, tourmaline and emeralds).
As well as Tanzanians, people from Mali, Ethiopia, the
Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Somalia,
Nigeria and Cameroon are also listed as being among
the foreigners involved in northern Mozambican criminal
markets. The proceeds of their criminal activities are
often reinvested in small shops selling a variety of goods,
such as car parts, food and clothes.49
There is also evidence that larger shipments of heroin
enter Mozambique by road from Tanzania and Kenya
en route to South Africa. To pass through the territory,
these shipments rely on bribery and general lack of
law enforcement, though this criminal system is not
watertight – as evidenced by the 600 kilograms seized
at the Namoto border in 2013 (discussed below), which
was probably a shipment of this nature. Traffic on this
route, however, is probably minimal. The roads are
poor and there is little traffic, making heroin smugglers
more conspicuous. However, traffickers who do use
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 13
this route, as told to us by our sources in Mozambique
in September 2017, will indirectly benefit from the
unofficial prohibition on publicising hard-drug seizures
and the degree to which drug enforcement is neglected
in Mozambiquee50 (both discussed below).
Another phenomenon in Mozambique is the rise of
more modular, smaller, remotely-controlled foreign
groups involved in the transit heroin trade on the
southern route. This may have arisen as a result of
Magufuli’s crackdown in Tanzania (see below) and the
increased number of seizures off the Kenyan coast by
the CMF. According to interviews with security officials:
The new networks appear to be controlled from
outside Mozambique, with relatively junior controllers
and special warehouses inside Mozambique.
Movement of drugs is done by people contracted
and paid for specific jobs, often assigned by mobile
phone, WhatsApp or Blackberry, which are encrypted.
The wide availability of good mobile telephone
coverage in north-east Mozambique since about 2015
makes this a sensible model for the expansion of the
heroin trade there. Mozambique has now become so
corrupted that the freelance drivers working for the
new networks are simply given money to bribe the
police and other officials; their fee for the job is any
money they do not spend on bribes.51
This trade may employ – on a temporary and ad hoc
basis – people involved in the small-scale drug, gems
and black-market goods economy in the north.
It is not clear where the packaging for transit heroin is
carried out, or if adulteration is done in Mozambique.
However, the networks involved in the trade own
several businesses in Nacala and Nampula, like trucking
companies and hotels, and industrial facilities such as
warehouses, which would certainly facilitate this.
In Nampula drugs are hidden in motor vehicles and
shipped by road to South Africa – their destination
is City Deep, a dry port in Johannesburg (for a more
detailed overview, see the next section). This is a journey
of some 3 300 km. The drug consignments are typically
transported in specially prepared vehicles. A light pickup
(known as a bakkie in South Africa) or a 4x4 vehicle,
such as a Toyota Hilux, might carry between 20 kg and
100 kg; specially prepared larger trucks can carry 100 kg
to 200 kg.52
On the road route from Mozambique to South
Africa, partly because of corruption and partly
because Mozambican border control is so severely
under-resourced,53 no seizures have been made
on the Mozambican side of the border. There have,
however, been several large seizures in South Africa
of drugs hidden in vehicles that have entered
from Mozambique.54
South Africa
South Africa has the largest economy in southern and
East Africa, well-developed transport infrastructure
and modern international telecommunications, a
sophisticated banking sector that sits alongside a huge
cash-based informal market, and by far the biggest
internal consumer market in the region. Interviews
suggest much of the region’s illicit trade in drugs is
destined for South Africa, either for onward traffic to ‘the
other ocean’55 and on to Europe or the US, or for the
South African consumer market.
Interviews suggest much of the
region’s illicit trade in drugs is
destined for South Africa
The multiplicity of entry points into the country is
worth noting: South Africa has 11 airports that act as
ports of entry.56 However, the main airports that service
international trade are OR Tambo (Johannesburg), King
Shaka (Durban) and Cape Town International Airport.
Along South Africa’s 2 500 kilometres of coastline are
eight seaports that operate as ports of entry.57 The
busiest is Durban Harbour, which handles 60% of all
maritime trade destined for South Africa, and which
is also used as a transit point for imports and exports
coming from or going to other African countries. In such
instances, customs duty is not paid in South Africa and
in-transit cargo is not checked by South African Customs
on arrival or departure. The proximity of this port to a
network of trains and truck terminals makes it attractive
for smugglers.58
South Africa also has a dry port of entry situated at City
Deep in Johannesburg. This is Africa’s biggest inland
port, with a capacity of 400 000 TEUs (twenty-foot
equivalent units) a year. Containers are carried by rail or
truck from City Deep to the country’s ports, from where
they are shipped without further customs inspection.
City Deep is near Johannesburg’s suburb of Bedfordview,
14 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
where key criminal actors in the ‘import-export’ business
have told the authors over months of research that the
dry port is critical to the region’s criminal operations.59
Because of the balance of trade between South Africa
and its neighbours, each day hundreds of trucks leave the
country with full loads but return with empty containers.
In the highly competitive trucking industry, interviewees
suggested, agreeing to use the empty container on the
return journey to transport illicit goods, or for trafficking
people, can add to the company’s profit margins.60
The country’s land borders with neighbouring countries
– Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, Botswana, Mozambique
and Zimbabwe – cover approximately 3 500 km. There
are 54 official border posts,61 but in a number of areas
the borderline between South Africa and its neighbours
is demarcated by nothing more than cattle fencing.
The heroin that supplies South Africa’s growing local
market is supplied, the authors believe, by perhaps
hundreds of small shipments by mules travelling from
East Africa on public transport and even on foot over
borders.62 Some is heroin that is skimmed off transit
shipments along the road network (e.g. by the driver).
There are also larger consignments of drugs that arrive
through ports.
From the Mozambican–South African border, heroin
appears to be transported by road to Durban
and Pretoria, which are hubs for repackaging and
distribution to other cities. Heroin is also moved to
Nelson Mandela Bay and Cape Town. In Nelson Mandela
Bay, barrels containing heroin are apparently dropped
overboard from ships and collected by divers working
in abalone poaching networks.63 Once illicit goods
are inside the country, there is a comprehensive road
network and a very large number of domestic flights,
particularly between the two main economic centres,
Cape Town and Johannesburg, with no customs checks.
In South Africa the number of ports of entry and long
international borders mean that there a range of entry
options available to those involved in trafficking illicit
goods, and these routes can be changed and shifted
should the risks associated with a particular route
become too high. (In some cases, the shifting of a
route will not be permanent and once the attention
of law enforcement shifts, the traffickers will return to
that route, albeit with slight changes to their modus
operandi.) Within this complex network of points of
entry for illicit goods, our interviews nonetheless identify
Durban and its port, Johannesburg with the City Deep
dry port and OR Tambo Airport, and Cape Town, with its
port and airport, as the country’s major heroin hubs.
Once in South Africa, heroin is consolidated for smaller
shipments and repackaged for onward transport by air
or sea.
Once in South Africa, heroin
is consolidated for smaller
shipments and repackaged for
onward transport by air or sea
According to interviews with knowledgeable
Mozambicans, in the early years of the regional trade,
heroin was sent directly to ports, notably Durban
and, to a lesser extent, Maputo, where it was put into
containers.64 This operational approach has changed,
with Johannesburg now being used as the main
warehousing and transshipment point.65 The corruption
endemic in City Deep and the long-standing and
extensive corruption at OR Tambo Airport are important
factors explaining this shift.66
However, other ports in South Africa also appear to be
used as major export points. Given what we know about
the organised-crime landscape in South Africa, these are
likely to be run by certain, possibly competing, criminal
networks. For example, Cape Town is also used to export
contraband. In June 2017 police in the farming town
of Villiersdorp, 250 km from Cape Town, found 963 kg
of heroin, one of the largest seizures ever made in the
country.67 The heroin was divided into 253 packets
that were concealed inside cases of wine destined for
export.68 This was the first heroin seizure in five years in
the Western Cape province; it came as a shock to law
enforcement, who had not had intelligence that the
Cape was a major transshipment corridor. It is believed
that the heroin had been made up from a number of
smaller shipments from several suppliers, which had
later been consolidated.69
This seizure corroborated information the authors
were given by sources in East Africa – namely that
heroin is shipped in containers of non-perishable solid
goods – cases of wine, stone, tiles, etc. These are easier
to escape scanning and easier to leave for longer in a
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 15
European port.70 The Port of Cape Town is not renowned
for corruption, which gives traffickers an advantage,
particularly by using containers carrying export goods
that do not normally attract attention, such as wine
and fruit, and because containers declaring such export
goods will be assigned a relatively low risk rating by
customs authorities in the receiving countries, making
them less likely to be searched.71
Criminal governance systems
What drives the heroin trade on the
southern route?
Interviews conducted across the region revealed a
remarkable similarity in terms of the timelines of surges
in organised crime and trafficking in each country under
study. In all the countries, small-scale heroin traffickers
were operating back in the 1980s, when their markets
were often connected to tourism. However, the bulk
transit trade really took off in the mid-1990s; later,
there was another period of escalation beginning in the
early 2000s.
The criminal-governance
systems of the ‘underworld’
mirror the fragmentation,
fault lines and politics of
the ‘upperworld’
Interviews and discussions would suggest that this
timeline has been shaped by both internal and external
factors. Internally, several of the coastal countries in
the region – South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania and
Kenya – went through periods of political and economic
change in the 1990s, usually involving a move towards
multi-party democracy and market liberalisation (this
was certainly the case in Mozambique and Tanzania,
and, to a lesser degree, South Africa). The argument
here, however, is not that democracy per se led to an
increase in the illicit economy, but that it gave rise to an
urgent need, at least among some actors, for money to
fund political-party campaigning and political patronage
networks. Illicit economies have become closely linked
to these developments.
In terms of the external factors, there were bumper crops
of poppies in Afghanistan and surrounding countries in
the late 1990s and early part of the following decade,
which meant drug cartels were able to shift more
product. This trend has not abated. The most recent
figures for poppy production were estimated at 328 000
hectares in 2017, a 63% increase on the previous year.72
This staggering rise in production is likely to increase the
flow of heroin along all routes even further.
Then, for heroin cartels, the two main trafficking routes
– across Central Asia and the Balkans – were disrupted
by war and more effective enforcement. This made the
more circuitous, but much more unguarded southern
route along Africa’s east coast more attractive and,
over the long term, potentially more reliable, despite
the geographic diversion it has introduced as a route
to market. The route is also built on established
networks between Pakistan and individuals on the East
African coast.
Global developments that occurred at the same time as
these shifts also led countries in this region to become
more enmeshed in the wider global illicit economy.
Along with East and southern Africa’s increase in trade
came so-called ‘deviant globalisation’73 – in other words,
better integration with global money-laundering systems
and criminal networks. The position of Dubai and the air
linkages between the city and locations along the coast
are critical when it comes to understanding money flows
and the wider criminal system now present. The heroin
market grew at the same time as these developments,
creating a perfect storm of converging trends.
Political protection and criminal-market
consolidation
The East African coastal criminal economy has been
developing for three decades, driven by formative
processes of economic liberalisation, globalisation
and transitions towards multi-party democracy. As
such, the criminal economy is both shaped by and, in
turn, contributes to shaping politics across the region.
Understanding the criminal governance of the heroin
trade in the region is crucial if one is to understand its
relationship to political elites, the licit economy and its
implications for development. It has been found that
the criminal-governance systems of the ‘underworld’
more or less mirror the fragmentation, fault lines,
degree of centralised control and shifts in the politics
of the ‘upperworld’.
16 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
The following sections analyse the history of the heroin
trade in the four countries along the coast under study,
the major networks that are or have been involved and
the development of political protection for the trade.
Each case concludes with a comment on criminalmarket
consolidation and criminal governance.74
Kenya
History and illicit networks
In the 1990s, families on the coast of Kenya who had,
or established, links with connections to Pakistani drug
networks and European buyers began to transship
heroin through the region. These included the wellknown
Akasha family, who achieved notoriety when the
family patriarch was murdered in Amsterdam following
a drug deal that had gone awry in 2001. After the
father’s death, the family continued to traffic drugs, but
there was infighting, and the family came under scrutiny
as the face of Kenya’s heroin trade.75 As a result, they
began to lose political protection, culminating in the
extradition of two Akasha brothers, and an Indian and
Pakistani associate, in early 2017.76
The Akashas were not the only Mombasa family
operating in the trade in the 1990s. Another alleged
kingpin was Tahir Sheikh Said, who died in 2017.77
Later, as drug trafficking and politics shifted into closer
orbit, the trade moved inland and Nairobi became a key
hub. Many major figures were active in Nairobi in the
early 2000s, having begun their careers there.78
Between 2001 and 2008, there were numerous public
allegations of drug trafficking in Kenya, and several
MPs and their associates were named.79 Of those listed
in a US embassy report, and subsequently named in
Parliament as being linked to the narcotics trade, six
are current or former holders of political office. Among
them, five have held (or still do hold) political office
in Kenya’s Eastern Province: William Kabogo, former
Kiambu County governor; Gideon Mbuvi (alias Mike
Sonko), 2nd Governor of Nairobi; John Harun Mwau,
former assistant minister and former MP for Kilome;
Simon Mbugua, former MP for Kamukunji (in Nairobi);
and Mary Wambui, former MP for Othaya.
From the coastal region, Ali Hassan Joho, Governor
of Mombasa, and his brother Abubakar, as well as
Mombasa businessman Ali Punjani, were also named
as prominent drug traffickers in the same report (in
fact, the US report allegedly claims that Punjani and
several other traffickers funded Ali Hassan Joho’s 2007
campaign to win a seat as an MP for Mombasa80). Harun
Mwau, along with businesswoman Mwanaidi Mfundo
(alias Mama Lela), who is now in prison in Tanzania on
drug-trafficking charges, were listed as drug ‘kingpins’
by the US in 2011.81 All have denied these allegations.
A subsequent investigation into claims made in the
Kenyan Parliament by police was said to have absolved
them, but in very controversial circumstances.82
Harun Mwau, perhaps the most prominent figure
caught up in these allegations, has been widely cited by
our interlocutors as an early ‘model’ of how to combine
the shadow economy, politics and business.83 Mwau has
repeatedly denied being involved in drug trafficking. He
is a prominent businessman and former shareholder
in the region’s biggest supermarket chain, Nakumatt
(holding shares worth US$10 million, which he has
since offloaded). He owned a bank (Charterhouse), and
has had a varied political career: he headed the anticorruption
agency and was a national lawmaker; he also
ran for president. He was a major funder of Mwai Kibaki’s
election campaign as president and was subsequently
appointed as assistant transport minister, a position in
which he appears to have been responsible for Kenya’s
container transport arrangements and for the Kenya
Ports Authority, which controls all ports of entry and
inland container terminals in Kenya.84 Mwau resigned
from this position after being named in Parliament as
being linked to drug trafficking. For many years, Mwau
operated an inland container depot at Athi River on
the outskirts of Nairobi, known as the Pepe Container
Freight Station.
These are just the most public figures linked to the
trade. Reportedly, there are other Swahili-Arab families
from the coastal region involved in the drug trade, who
are said to have kept a low profile but remain active
and successful in the trade.85 ‘Arab coastal networks
have several hundred years of diplomacy behind them,’
said one anti-corruption activist. ‘They would never
threaten you to your face. There is a grace to the way
they do things. They cooperate with the [drug traffickers
operating out of Nairobi].’ 86
It is difficult to put an exact figure to the number of
kingpins and barons involved in Kenya’s drug trade. But
numerous interviews suggest that the country’s narcoindustry
is controlled by syndicates that are fluid. In the
past 15 years, a number of individuals and groups have
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 17
collapsed, while new ones have been formed to fill the
void. In addition to local traffickers, numerous foreign
individuals and foreign networks have been involved
in the heroin trade in Kenya. (The box below provides
more detail.)
The Kenyan drugs trade has evolved and now has many
different manifestations. It was labelled as ‘chaotic’
in one 2014 analysis, the implication being that it is
fragmented and often highly competitive.87 Arguably,
one can make a useful (though not entirely neat)
distinction between kingpins and what are generally
described as ‘barons’ by locals in the region. The former
trade in large volumes for transit, operating almost
exclusively by sea transport, either through dhow
deliveries or container deliveries of drugs. These kingpins
include coastal families, who mostly run kinship-based
businesses and tend to keep a lower profile, as well as
prominent Nairobi businessmen cum politicians, who
tend to be more public figures.
Foreign networks in Kenya’s drugs trade
In line with the notion that Kenya is a fragmented
drugs market, which allows openings for outsiders
who can forge local relations, various foreigners seem
to have worked their way into the trade with the
help of Kenyan partners over the last decade. These
syndicates operate (or operated) mostly in Nairobi,
but with bases in Mombasa. Among them have been
Pakistanis, South Africans, Seychellois and Mauritians,
some of them barons from these countries or from
Uganda, Tanzania and West Africa.
One example is Clement Serge Bristol, a Seychellois
who was arrested with three Kenyans (Mohamed
Bakari Mohmed, Sharif Mzee Mohamed and Ahmed
Hussein Salim) in possession of 7.6 kg of heroin on a
luxury yacht that had just arrived from Kilifi, on the
Kenyan coast. The yacht, the Baby Iris, was registered
in Singapore and owned by a Briton. It was blown
up and sunk by the Kenyan police – thereby also
destroying a key exhibit in the ensuing court case.
Another example is the network controlled by the
so-called Artur Brothers (Artur Margaryan and Artur
Sargsyan), Armenians who teamed up with Mary
Wambui (rumoured to be former president Kibaki’s
mistress). The brothers were expelled in June 2006,
having been in Kenya for only a few months. Eight
guns and 100 rounds of ammunition were found in
their compound after their departure. To justify their
stay in Kenya, the brothers were appointed to top
positions in the Kenyan government – remarkably, as
assistant police commissioners – and were deployed
to harass those critical of the Kibaki regime. At
one time, they travelled as ‘prominent Kenyan
businessmen’ on a presidential jet to Uganda.
As well as Gulam Hussein and Vijaygiri Goswami,
deported alongside the Akasha brothers, two
other drug barons, Dominguez and Nedy Micock
(nationals of the Seychelles), and Barend Nolte and
Marc Faivelewitz (South Africans) were deported
in February 2017, a month after the Akashas were
extradited to the US.
The criminal organisation with the most established
footprint in East Africa is the Italian mafia,
particularly figures linked to the Sicilian Cosa Nostra,
who have an established presence on the Kenyan
coast and in southern Africa. The authors were told
that the mafia is also present in Zanzibar but were
unable to verify this. The Kenyan coastal town of
Malindi is said to be the base from where Italian
mafia members run money laundering, drugs,
prostitution and weapon-trafficking rackets, across
both Kenya and Somalia.88 For example, Mario Mele,
an Italian businessman and fugitive from Italian
justice, who has been linked to the Cosa Nostra,
owns a popular cafe in Malindi.89 Italians in Malindi
have been repeatedly linked to the cocaine trade in
East Africa and, to a lesser extent, the heroin trade.
Malindi is also reportedly home to fugitives from
Germany and Eastern Europe. According to journalist
Paul Gitau, ‘The Law Society of Kenya says it has
evidence that the coastal town is firmly in the grip of
the Italian Mafia, which controls and compromises
the administration of justice.’90
The Cosa Nostra has also had a presence and
business operations further south. Vito Palazzolo, a
‘banker’ for the Cosa Nostra, took refuge in South
Africa for several decades before being apprehended
and imprisoned in Italy. And in 2011, Antonino
Messicati Vitale, a one-time boss of the Cosa Nostra
visited southern Africa and was linked to diamond
deals in Zimbabwe and South Africa.91
The Kenyan drug barons run smaller amounts of heroin
(in batches of several kilograms at a time) into and
through Kenya, and supply local and regional consumer
markets. They also send small amounts to European
markets by air.92 They primarily deploy drug mules,
who travel by air and land, to move the product into
and out of Kenya.93 They may also have a network of
street dealers, who sell product for them in Mombasa
and Nairobi. These barons have had a presence since
the 1990s; their mule routes switched from using
18 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Kenyan airports to Entebbe, Uganda, when security
became tighter.94
Many drug-trafficking figures – at the kingpin and baron
levels in the hierarchy – combine the smuggling of
narcotics and other commodities (such as sugar, rice
and electronics) with poaching and counterfeiting. By
adopting this diversified approach to business, they
can readily switch their activities to stay afloat during
a downturn in any of their business lines, or when they
come under pressure from the authorities.
They also run legal businesses, such as clearing and
forwarding companies, which facilitate their illicit
trade. Of the ‘big names’ linked to narcotics in Kenya’s
Parliament in 2010, nine own (or at least used to
own) import and export companies, cargo-clearing
establishments and container freight stations, in
Mombasa and Nairobi. Some have owned retail
businesses, which can be used to disguise imports and
launder money.
One of the notable evolutions
in Kenya’s criminal economy
is the increased integration
of drug networks and
political office
One of the most notable evolutions in Kenya’s criminal
economy is the exponential increase in the integration
of drug networks and political office. Money derived
from heroin and cocaine has been used to fund multiple
election campaigns, and drug traffickers themselves
have campaigned for political power funded by drug
money. ‘They are no longer seeking to compromise the
political system,’ said one interviewee. ‘They are seeking
to control the political system.’95
Political protection
In the 1990s, the Akashas initially operated without
high-level political protection but, as they began to
accumulate more wealth, they allegedly attracted
the attention of some political leaders in the ruling
party. The Akashas were reportedly offered – or it was
demanded that they accept – protection in exchange for
political donations.96 This form of political involvement
has never been proven or documented, however. Kenya
was purely a corridor for heroin at this point, and one
long-term observer believes that the first wave of major
heroin traffickers cut a deal, similar to the one that has
arguably prevailed in Mozambique (discussed further
below), whereby it was agreed there would be no local
selling and thus no local consumption. The deal was
soon broken.97
After Kenya’s transition to multi-party democracy,
political elites’ ability to provide protection would have
diminished and new power holders emerged on the
scene. Drug dealers began to fund actors across the
political spectrum (and sometimes more than one) to
secure protection of their trade, and the number of
those involved in the drug economy increased.
Harun Mwau’s alleged involvement in drug trafficking
was said to have flourished during both the Daniel
arap Moi and, later, Mwai Kibaki presidencies. However,
since President Uhuru Kenyatta assumed power, his
fortunes have faded. The Akashas’ interests were also
said to have been damaged by the transition from Moi
to Kibaki, after which, weakened by infighting, they fell
prey to extortion by successive regimes. Interviews with
journalists in Mombasa indicate that the Akashas and
their associates were extradited to the US, more than a
year after the official request for extradition, only after
they refused to pay more bribes to top politicians.98
Kenyatta seems to have effected a moderate crackdown
on the trade – reportedly to curry favour with the
US, which is seen as a key security partner for Kenya.
By contrast, in the current phase of the evolution of
Kenya’s heroin networks, it has become more and more
common for heroin traffickers to campaign directly for
political power.
This phenomenon is fuelled by the relationship between
money and politics, and the huge expenses incurred by
Kenya’s electoral processes. Campaigners estimate that
in Kenya’s recent election, the incumbent, Kenyatta,
spent US$50 million on his re-election campaign. Media
reports suggest it costs as much as US$6 million for a
successful governorship campaign alone.99 One of our
key interlocutors, a person who is active in the logistics
of political campaigning in Mombasa, claimed it costs
at least US$2 million to contest a gubernatorial position
in his county.100 (The Kenyan government spent at least
US$500 million on the election itself, making it one of
the most expensive in the world.)101 For decades now,
the political patronage system has been influenced by
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 19
money – cash that is needed to bribe, buy votes and
manipulate the political process.
Whereas those already in power can derive substantial
resources through the state, people who are not yet in
power must look to other sources for political funding.
Our interviews suggest that, for some candidates,
these political slush funds come from those involved in
transnational crime, including drug trafficking, money
laundering, pirating, human trafficking, terrorism
financing etc. In the words of one opposition politician,
‘[The heroin traffickers] know the whole deficiency
that the system has – particularly the opposition.
These people manifest themselves as backers of
political parties, and part of their incentive is that they
will recoup the investment. As a result, they ingrain
themselves in the political system, in order to protect
their business.’102
Political slush funds come from
those involved in transnational
crime, including drug trafficking
This system is facilitated by the nature of party politics
in Kenya, which is highly individualised. Said one
interviewee: ‘Political parties here belong to leaders
– they can change them at will. That’s why the drug
money all goes to individuals.’103 This individualised
nature of political influence can also lead to the need
to back several horses in order to secure full protection,
and to manage the tensions that arise from numerous
competing (and fluid) allegiances between traffickers
and politicians.
Multipolar competition
The move by drug traffickers into politics has
apparently arisen, in part, because of the transaction
costs associated with preventing conflict with other
traffickers, who are all vying for market space to
operate, and to secure political protection in a fluid
political system. In short, in Kenya, becoming an MP
or senator is a way of cutting out the middle man and
acquiring political protection more directly. It is not
attractive to all players, however: the gamble inherent
in the move is that public office does increase scrutiny,
albeit in a system with a large amount of impunity for
organised criminals.
At the same time, these efforts to contain conflict
have not been wholly successful, and illicit markets
are feeding violence and instability. According to one
participant, ‘Whenever there is a change of government,
some cartels benefit and others lose out. And those
that lose out don’t go out quietly.’104 Senior police
and intelligence officers have been killed in turf wars
between crime lords. Mombasa chief detective Hassan
Abdillahi was assassinated in 2006. Two brothers of
William Kabogo, a former MP linked to the drug trade,
were arrested over the murder.105 It is claimed that
a rival drug cartel felt that Abdillahi was close to the
Akasha family. Another victim, Erastus Kirui Chemorei,
who controlled access to a US$60 million cocaine haul
seized in a villa in Malindi, was gunned down by a
contingent of 70 police officers in February 2005, after
he was branded as a rogue policeman. It emerged later
that he was a victim of a turf war between cartels linked
to Harun Mwau and that of Wambui.106
Drawing on the evidence we have accumulated, we
feel it accurate to characterise the northern area of the
east coast criminal economy, centred on Nairobi and
Mombasa, as one of multipolar competition. This means
that there are multiple powerful figures who control
part of one, or part of several, illicit markets. These
figures sometimes operate with managed harmony
but, in some cases, compete fiercely for market share.
While competing, however, criminal actors also keep
an eye on achieving a degree of stability, without which
criminal business would not be possible in the first
place. New entrants can start trading in these markets,
but they have to bide their time if they are to challenge
the bigger established players. Political protection
can be sought in a variety of ways. In the words of
a prominent civil society leader, ‘Fragmentation is a
characteristic of Kenyan politics – and, as a result, also of
the Kenyan underworld.’107
Several participants in this study remarked on
something that has accompanied the integration of
these various criminal economies into Kenya’s licit
economy and political system – in the midst of both
impunity and a vibrant press: that there is a deleterious
mix of complacency and expediency.
Alongside this, there is a recognition that money is
needed to acquire political power. Meanwhile, the
marked degree of polarisation along ethnic and other
lines in the country, which produces a ‘winner takes all’
attitude to elections, means that political candidates
20 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
are not punished for unsavoury associations. Said
one expert commentator on corruption and the illicit
economy: ‘We are increasingly more and more forgiving
of misconduct that we would otherwise disapprove of, if
it creates opportunity for the political side we support to
get ahead.’
In Kenya’s 2017 elections, in which Raila Odinga, the
main opposition candidate, had substantial financial
(and public) backing from Hassan Joho, governor of
Mombasa, Kenyans referred to individuals linked to drug
dealing in their political camps as their ‘pharmacists’.
‘In the 80s and 90s it was very, very different – there was
a real sense of revulsion towards drug barons,’108 said a
lawyer and human-rights activist.
In general, people we spoke to were extremely cynical
about the prospect for any major change, including
efforts towards dismantling Kenya’s illicit networks,
as the structural features that allow for the current
situation show no signs of changing.
Tanzania
History and networks
Geographically at the centre of the coastal criminal
economy, Tanzania has, for decades, provided a
conducive setting for transnational organised smuggling
rings centred on heroin and the illegal wildlife trade
to flourish. The country has also been, until recently,
a safe launching pad for trans-border sorties into
Kenya and Mozambique for poaching and drug
running. But, just as Tanzania may have played an
important role in solidifying the coastal market, it is
now playing an equally important role in its disruption
and displacement.
In the 1980s, Tanzania’s traffickers sourced small
amounts of heroin from Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan and
India through mules. Those networks would provide
local couriers with tickets for international travel and
dupe them into believing that they were going to be
offered jobs abroad.109 This situation changed in the
mid-1990s, when larger volumes of drugs began arriving
in Tanzania. Some people believe that heroin use – and
the lucrative heroin-smuggling trade – spread from
Zanzibar to mainland Tanzania. In the mid-1990s, the
semi-autonomous island had opened itself up to the
global tourism economy, and heroin was brought to
the island by drug mules to supply the foreign tourist
population, which created a local-user base. This
market remained small until around 2000, when the
amount, type and price of heroin changed, and use then
escalated rapidly.110
The relationship between political protection and heroin
in Tanzania did not become obvious to the public until
the early 2000s, when relatives of prominent politicians
began to be linked to the heroin trade.111 The number
of high-profile arrests of Tanzanians outside the country
rose, as did the number of heroin addicts on the streets.
By the middle of that decade, the heroin economy, in
the words of one investigative journalist, ‘became normal
… drugs became prevalent, the intelligence agency
and police were almost openly involved, and everyone
[linked to the trade] became rich. It was routine to hear
that politicians and police were involved.’112
Tanzania has, for decades,
provided a conducive setting
for transnational organised
smuggling rings
Tanzanian intelligence found that heroin was entering
the country though dhows around 2006, though it
was not clear that this knowledge led to any effective
measures against the trade. There hadn’t been many
large seizures around that time but, then, in September
2011, Tanzanian authorities seized 210 kg of heroin in
the coastal town of Lindi, which had been brought in
by dhow.
The heroin networks operating in Zanzibar are
reportedly composed of elite local businessmen, hotel
owners and public officials. The so-called ‘big dealers’,
or kingpins, keep a very low profile in Zanzibar. As a
close observer of the drug market said: ‘The big dealers
do their work in secret. There are about seven to ten
big dealers in Zanzibar. There are some dealers who
are hidden and have power in government. Some
are big in the police.’113 In Dar es Salaam, kingpins
named by the government in the current crackdown
include politicians, businessmen, musicians and a
famous preacher.
By contrast, the regular dealers, who deploy pushers
to sell katte, small pellets of heroin, on the street are
usually well known among the local communities
because of their rapid rise in wealth.114
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 21
In recent years, a significant mainland local heroin trade
and addiction crisis have developed and spread across
the country, driven by home-grown drug gangs. On the
mainland, use has spread across Dar es Salaam, where
unga houses (places for smoking heroin) are ubiquitous
in the slums, and along the coast, even into rural villages
in the coastal region.
Tanzanian nationals also seem to control or coordinate
a large amount of the secondary heroin market in the
region. Tanzanian networks, which transport small and
medium-sized shipments, have a presence in Kenya and
Mozambique, and a strong presence in South Africa,
where they control the heroin consumption market.115
As mentioned, the amount that some of them traffic is
enough to supply many of thousands of users in South
Africa’s major cities.116
Tanzanian networks have
a presence in Kenya and
Mozambique, and a strong
presence in South Africa
In a detailed study of Tanzania’s ‘beachboys’ – a name
given to Tanzanian men who have formed a community
subculture, escaping from Tanzania by stowing away on
container ships and temporarily basing themselves in
ports around the world before moving on again – author
Sean Christie paints a picture of how substantially
integrated, in terms of users, mules and pushers, this
underworld community is in the regional heroin trade.
He describes one such small-scale network:
Freshly deported Beachboys tended to invest a
portion of [the compensation they were awarded
for deportation] in unga [heroin] for smuggling
back to South Africa when the time came to return.
Not many Cape Town dealers were interested in
chasing after such small quantities, but Bath [a
Tanzanian dealer in Cape Town] had discovered
that these regular infusions – anywhere between 10
and 250 grams per traveller – ensured consistency of
supply all year round.117
Political protection
A veteran political and investigative journalist has traced
the beginning of political protection of the drugs trade
in Tanzania to the move away from single-party rule
to multi-party contestation in the mid-1990s,118 and
the shift from a socialist economy to an open market.
The change can be seen in particular in the mass
privatisation of many of the country’s 400-plus stateowned
enterprises (SOEs) in 1993:119
The drugs problem probably started when we were
doing liberalisation. People sold SOEs like giveaway
prizes. It was a period of boom. Greed drove it. The
market was opening up, everything was coming in,
everything was there and people wanted everything!
But they didn’t have money. So, they did what they
need to get money.120
Between the mid-1990s and 2015, Tanzania achieved
high levels of economic growth, but this happened in a
context of numerous grand corruption scandals within
the ruling party, and a general failure of political and
economic institutions to channel money into broadbased
growth. Instead they concentrated wealth and
power in a few hands.121
Despite rising popular discontent with corruption
and poverty, the ruling party, Chama Cha Mapinduzi
(CCM), continued to be re-elected, though opposition
parties, the largest of which was Chadema, led by
Freeman Mbowe, made moderate gains in each
election.122 Between 1995 and 2015, party financing
and the amount spent on winning elections grew in
aggregate, as did the party’s reliance on capital-intensive
methods of mobilising attendance at political rallies.123
For example, during President Benjamin Mkapa’s
administration, the government passed the Traditional
Hospitality Act, which allowed politicians to ‘reward’
their constituents for attending events. Decried by the
opposition for creating an unfair advantage for richer
parties and for taking advantage of voters’ poverty, the
act was later repealed.124
More recently, writer and academic Dan Paget has
noted how helicopters have been increasingly deployed
as a highly effective way of mobilising voters:
At one illustrative rally in 2005, Mbowe arrived by
helicopter. A local newspaper reported that ‘The
helicopter hovering within the [town of] Usa River
caused major stir in the township as thousands of
people left their regular tasks and rushed towards
the open air venue’. I have witnessed this mode of
aviation drawing crowds first-hand. At a rally in a
small village in Iramba, my field notes record that
22 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
a helicopter drew a crowd of approximately 600
people [within] just twenty minutes of landing.125
The increasing use of helicopters is but one symptom
of political campaign trends in Tanzania that have
meant growing reliance on party donors, rather than
party branches or other ‘labour-intensive’ methods
of canvassing voters. These kinds of heavily financed
developments have raised questions about how
candidates fund such activities. Gray, for example,
has documented the rise of private-sector donors in
Tanzania, and over the years a growing number of
CCM MPs have been businessmen.126 And although
the Chadema party claims that its growth in campaign
finance has come from absorbing the professional
classes into the ranks of its membership,127 our
interviews suggest that, for some politicians in both the
CCM and opposition parties, illicit funds are a crucial
source of campaign finance. According to one journalist,
it was possible to spot which MPs were taking money
from drug traffickers, as they would work together, even
across political divides, to prevent legislation or policy
measures that would damage the trade.128
Several things suggest that
drug traffickers were receiving
substantial political protection
in Tanzania
Several things suggest that drug traffickers were
receiving substantial political protection in Tanzania
between (at least) 2000 and 2015. For one, anti-drug
interventions were ineffective in numerous respects.
Tanzania was unable to make seizures at sea. Even
though, admittedly, the navy and coast guard are small
and underfunded, there does not appear to have been
any attempt to prevent the booming dhow-based
heroin trade.129
Then, during Mkapa’s administration, people widely
suspected of being drug barons or kingpins were
given diplomatic passports.130 A National Task Force
formed by President Jakaya Kikwete in 2006 seemingly
made no ground: government documents reveal that
there were no meaningful seizures of heroin during
this period. Although UNODC estimated that several
tonnes of heroin were transiting through the country
during that time, the largest seizure since 2000 was 400
kilograms in 2014.131 Hundreds of people were arrested
for drug-related offences, but they were mostly streetlevel
dealers; major foreign traffickers and kingpins were
never exposed. The average seizure volume associated
with arrest was 700 grams.132
There are some exceptions to this pattern, however, such
as the arrest and prosecution of Mama Lela (a Kenyan
discussed above) and Ally Khatibu Haji, alias Shkuba.
These exceptions are also revealing. Both Mama Lela
and Shkuba had been listed by the US as kingpins,
and there seems to have been substantial international
pressure for action to be taken against them. Shkuba
was arrested in 2014 as he was about to board a flight
to South Africa, where he had been evading arrests for
two years. His extradition process was then mired in
the courts for three years, until May 2017 when he was
summarily (and without due process) extradited to the
US under President Magufuli’s watch.
In 2014, rumours circulated that a heroin shipment
belonging to Ridhiwani Kikwete, the then president’s
son, had been seized by the Chinese and that Kikwete
had been arrested. In exchange for his release, President
Kikwete is rumoured to have agreed to lucrative
contracts with the Chinese. This was reported in local
media in Kenya and Tanzania.133 People who have
worked at the Dar es Salaam port claim that senior
members of the political elite placed key figures
there to facilitate smuggling.134 A former government
official alleged that, during this same period, there
was continual interference from the Presidency in
law-enforcement interventions relating to drugs. He
also explained that key law-enforcement officials had
explicitly avoided questioning Ridhiwani Kikwete during
his father’s term, as it was seen as being a careerlimiting
move.135
Even if the rumour is entirely baseless, its enduring
appeal says something about the perceived relationship
between the political elite and the drug trade at the
time – as well as the country’s perceived vulnerability to
external manipulation as a result.
Disrupted market
President Magufuli, who was elected in 2015,136 has
taken strident moves to address graft, somewhat
stealing the wind from the opposition’s sails, whose
main line of attack against the CCM had been their
refusal or inability to deal with corrupt officials.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 23
Drugs did not form part of his election platform, and
it came as somewhat of a surprise when, in early
2017, Magufuli announced a major crackdown on the
drug trade. Acting through Dar es Salaam’s regional
commissioner, Paul Makonda, the president released
a list (described as the ‘list of shame’) of 97 people
who would be questioned in connection with the drug
trade. On the list were Ridhiwani Kikwete and Freeman
Mbowe, as well a host of other high-profile political
figures, businessmen and celebrities.137 In this move,
Magufuli appears to have some backing from civil
society, particularly from the Interfaith Council. Religious
leaders appear to have been motivated by the impact of
the heroin trade on their communities.138
Magufuli has also cracked down on corruption at the
Port of Dar es Salaam. This seems to have been triggered
by the discovery of falsely valued mining shipments for
export, the president claims, and therefore his efforts
are framed more as an attempt to regain control over
accurate tax revenue collection rather than as an anticontraband
initiative. Nevertheless, it is already having
an effect on contraband exports, and there are claims
that traffickers of wildlife and drugs have begun to
avoid using Dar es Salaam’s port.139 These measures are
slated to be replicated in Tanga, a port in the northeast,
and Mtwara, a port that has become key because
of the discovery of oil and gas in the south. According
to someone who works at the Dar es Salaam port,
Magufuli is a regular visitor, as is the prime minister,
demonstrating the importance of these measures to the
president’s broader anti-corruption drive140.
Comments about this crackdown by civil-society actors
and law-enforcement officials across the region were
mixed. Some observers see a pattern in the anti-drugs
crackdown that indicates, without hard evidence being
made public to support the allegation, that supporters
of Edward Lowassa141, and other key opposition figures,
are primary targets and under continuing pressure
(though, while this pressure is selective, it is not assumed
to be baseless). On the other hand, although Ridhiwani
Kikwete was questioned, he was never charged for
trafficking drugs, and his mother was nominated as an
MP by Magufuli, indicating the family remains in favour.
In this same vein, Magufuli’s broader set of anti-graft
measures and economic policies have also served to
shore up his own power base by ‘limit[ing] the political
finance available to the official opposition as well as
oppositional factions within CCM whilst reinforcing
Magufuli’s centralized control over resources’.142 That,
arguably, puts into clearer focus the nature of Magufuli’s
anti-drugs campaign, which is perhaps, like many
corruption crackdowns, shaped by political objectives
that are unrelated to its stated objectives.143
Magufuli’s broader set of antigraft
measures and economic
policies have also served to
shore up his own power base
Other commentators, who are in principle supportive
of the president’s crackdown on drug trafficking,
are worried that Magufuli’s approach was too
centralised and too dismissive of institution building
to be sustainable. ‘It will go when he does,’ said one
practitioner in drug rehabilitation in the Mombasa
area.144 An official from an intergovernmental
organisation spoke with frustration of the way the
president’s approach to reform often undermined its
own objectives: ‘He is weakening the institutions by
sacking people all the time. People are frightened
to make decisions. Management is weak. It’s a big
disruption.’145
Many are also worried about Magufuli’s authoritarian
moves. Much of Magufuli’s anti-drug campaign relies
on the efforts of Makonda, the regional commissioner
for Dar es Salaam. It was Makonda who, for example,
announced the ‘list of shame’, apparently containing
the names of key individuals involved in the drug
trade. Makonda is considered suspect by some of the
interviewees in this study; he was criticised harshly for
a disregard for due process.146 Magufuli is intolerant
of criticism and (as mentioned) has shut down five
newspapers since he took office in 2015. He has
interfered with judicial independence and is seen to
rule by executive order. But Magufuli may be just the
most visible symbol of a drift towards authoritarianism
that has been present in the party for several years.147
Nonetheless, this aspect of his rule is likely to become
more apparent.
Law-enforcement officials claim the anti-drugs effort is
going well. Although they have not made any arrests
of high-level traffickers to date, they say arrests are
in the pipeline.148 People who work with drug users,
however, claim the crackdown has mainly affected users
24 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
and small-scale dealers, and that they have even been
subjected to human-rights abuses.149
Military operations in Tanzania’s slums are also said to
have dispersed hardened Tanzanian gang members
to take cover overseas in Maputo, Durban and Cape
Town.150 There is also evidence that the measures the
president is enforcing in the Port of Dar es Salaam
are merely serving to displace smuggling, rather than
reduce its prevalence – a function of the integration
of the regional economy. Officials within Magufuli’s
administration concede that many operators in the
drug trade have merely been driven out of the country
into Mozambique, and that the drugs return across the
border in small quantities once the monsoon period is
over.151 And, although the number of ivory seizures has
fallen in Dar es Salaam’s port,152 sources in South Africa
say that, as regards heroin, heightened port checks
in Tanzania merely created a three-week lag in local
consumer markets as dealers switched routes in favour
of greater reliance on road and rail.153
It is because of these measures, following a period of
effective impunity for drug kingpins, that the networks
that make use of Tanzanian corridors and hubs can be
described as ‘disrupted’.
Mozambique
History and networks
A small network, composed of a number of Mozambican
families of Asian origin and with close ties to the ruling
party, has controlled the transit heroin trade in the
country for almost three decades. At the top of this
network, allegedly, is Mohamed Bachir Suleman (known
as MBS), who is accused by the US government of being
an international drugs trafficker. MBS is in ill health and
has been badly affected by the financial ramifications
of the US blacklisting, as well as political shifts within
the ruling party. However, a journalist who follows the
Maputo underworld closely confirms he maintains an
important role in the heroin trade.154
The MBS-linked cartel is said to control the coast
from the Tanzanian border south towards the town of
Angoche – a stretch of coastline some 700 km long that
encompasses the major deep container ports of Pemba
and Nacala, as well as a string of small islands close to
the shore. Nacala is considered to be the epicentre of
the country’s drug business in the north, while Nampula,
Mozambique’s third largest city, is a close second. The
MBS cartel deals in the bulk transshipment of heroin
and hashish, which arrive in dhow-based or container
shipments (as described above).
Momade Rassul Abdul Rahim (known primarily as
Momade Rassul) has the highest profile of the three
family patriarchs reportedly working under MBS. He is a
member of FRELIMO and has close links to senior party
figures. He is said to have had direct access to Armando
Guebuza when he was president. He is one of FRELIMO’s
designated ‘economic agents’, which comes with certain
privileges. According to one associate, ‘He wouldn’t
succeed if he wasn’t in FRELIMO’155 and his links with
the Guebuza administration, including through his wife’s
charitable work,156 have been well documented. Rassul
owns several hotels and other industrial businesses, and
reports a turnover of about US$60 million a year.157 There
is no proven link between Rassul and the drug trade,
though he was arrested in June 2017 in Maputo and
charged with money laundering, illegal enrichment and
tax fraud.158
The MBS-linked cartel is said
to control the coast from the
Tanzanian border south towards
the town of Angoche
The second central family is headed by Gulam Rassul
Moti, who runs the thriving Moti Group, a car-rental
company in Nampula.159 The Motis are third-generation
Mozambican citizens of Pakistani descent, who run a
large network of business interests across the country,
including import and export of electronic products and
clothing, and agricultural investments. Moti also owns a
supermarket, called Recheio, in Nampula.160 According
to an ex-resident of Nacala, 20 years ago, Moti ‘had
one shop selling capulanas161 and needles in Nacala
– now he controls the port. In addition to his car rental
company, he owns a pharmacy.’162
The third group is the Ayoob family, though they
appear to have less of a connection to Nampula and
Nacala, and seem to be more involved in investments in
Maputo. Currently, Faruk Ayoob owns and runs Ayoob
Comercial,163 a toyshop in downtown Maputo; he also
recently bought two hotels in Maputo: the Terminus and
the Monte Carlo. Faruk’s brother Momed was arrested
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 25
for drug possession and drug trafficking in separate
incidents in Portugal,164 and for money laundering in
Swaziland,165 before his death in 2012.
Interviewees in Nacala specifically linked Rassul and
Moti to smuggling incidents in Nacala.166 Both were
linked to the import of a container of motorbikes
in 2013 or thereabouts. It is alleged that heroin was
hidden in the petrol tanks of the bikes. Some of these
motorbikes – presumably once the heroin had been
removed – were subsequently sold at very low prices
to Rassul’s workers and the rest of were burnt.167 Moti
also regularly imports containers of products for his
pharmaceutical business and his supermarket, but there
are suspicions they contain drugs. Port workers and
employees of the Kudumba cargo-scanning company
told colleagues that they were ‘forbidden’ to scan Moti’s
containers.168 According to our sources, the issue of
scanning is closely tied up with the MBS network’s links
to the government, as explained below.
How did such tight control over the transit heroin trade
arise in Mozambique? Mozambique suffered a serious
civil war from 1977 to 1992. The end of the war was
a crucial precondition for the expansion of the heroin
market. There is only one major road that runs the
length of this long country, and it was frequently made
impassable during the war. Traffic between northern
and southern Mozambique resumed after the war, and
this road became crucial for land-based transport of
heroin from the north to Maputo, and on to South Africa.
Furthermore, the war was hugely destructive, and
Mozambique faced a mammoth rebuilding task, which
was highly reliant on closely monitored international aid,
and so, according to our sources, the ruling party sought
avenues to generate revenue that did not have strings
attached, and which could also be put to use to fund
the party.169 At around the same time, the country also
moved towards a market-based economy, and the way
this was done laid the foundation for an enmeshment
between crime, politics and business.170
The war may also have shaped who was able to
dominate illicit markets in the post-war period. It
is notable that several of Mozambique’s criminal
markets171 are dominated by people from the country’s
relatively small Asian-origin community. Some
commentators argue that this situation has arisen out of
a combination of their historical role as traders and their
international connections. Before independence, these
families were small-time traders in rural areas, and after
independence they moved into towns and occupied
the trading niches left unoccupied by departing
white settlers.
At the same time, unsure what would happen in
Mozambique, some Asian-origin Mozambicans,
according to a report by an expert on Mozambique:
... carefully divided their families, with some members
maintaining businesses in Mozambique while other
members went to Portugal and still others went to
Dubai, India and Pakistan. These links have been
maintained and have been important for money
laundering and the heroin, hashish and mandrax
trades. With the end of the war, a small group of
Asian-origin trading families based in Nampula
city and the port of Nacala became important,
particularly in importing electrical goods.172
A South African police analyst who worked extensively
on regional crime networks in the aftermath of
apartheid has argued that during the war, Mozambican
traders of Asian origin cornered the trade in blackmarket
currency, as well as other black-market goods
made scarce by war shortages and the disruptions of
the conflict.173 At the end of the war, these traders were
among the few Mozambicans with sufficient capital
to take advantage of economic opportunities as the
country adopted a market economy. They also came
to own currency-exchange bureaux, which proliferated
during this period. For those with an eye on illegal
trades, access to cash then funded the corruption of
senior officials.
While heroin appears to have begun moving through
Mozambique in the early or mid-1990s, the links
between MBS, Mozambique’s original (and still
dominant) drug baron, and the ruling party appear
to have been established during the administration
of President Joaquim Chissano. Chissano assumed
leadership of FRELIMO, and the country, in 1986 when
the then president, Samora Machel, died. Discussions in
our interviews frequently made a comparison between
FRELIMO’s position on corruption and contraband
before and after Machel. ‘The people who run the
scene in FRELIMO, they are not the liberators, they are
the new entrepreneurs,’ one informant told us. ‘... The
old guard – they had some sort of moral code.’174 The
Machel regime was said to be ideologically stricter and
that it maintained a consistent rhetoric that linked
corruption to betrayal of the party, the revolution
and the people. In 1983, for example, the authorities
26 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
famously executed in public Gulam Nabi, a prominent
member of the Muslim community, for his involvement
in black-market trade of prawns, without granting him
a right to defend himself.175
Chissano, on the other hand, presided over a period
of great economic, political and ideological transition.
He signed a peace deal with the opposition party,
RENAMO; the financial system was deregulated; and
Mozambique moved from a centrally planned to a
free-market economy. Along with massive economic
growth, this period is associated with the mushrooming
of organised-crime networks in the country. Chissano’s
administration was, according to journalists and
academics we interviewed in Maputo in September
2017, colloquially referred to as ‘deixa andar’, meaning
‘to let things go’. By the early 2000s, President Chissano
was publicly linked with MBS – he even attended MBS’s
son’s wedding in 2001.176
Interviewees speculated that some level of state
regulation of the heroin trade was arranged in this
period. According to Hanlon, Chissano had been
FRELIMO’s head of security for many years, and “had
the personal contacts needed to organise and regulate
the trade”.177 “There is no direct evidence of high-level
regulation, and any witnesses to such meetings are
unlikely to speak out”. But, on the basis of the research
findings it could be argued, there are symptoms that
such a practice is in place, which we describe below.
Rather than any written or formally acknowledged set
of rules, this ‘regulation’ can be understood as a longstanding,
resilient ‘practice’ between top drug traffickers
and top officials. It is believed to be based on a broad
understanding among some members of the leadership
elite – not all of whom may be directly involved – that
a quid pro quo exists around the heroin trafficking
economy, whereby government protection is extended
to the trade. In return, traffickers make payments that
benefit presentatives of the ruling elite, ensure there
is little local consumption, and make investments in
the Mozambican economy out of the proceeds of their
trade. In the two decades that Mozambique has been
a transit corridor for large volumes of heroin, there have
been no public drug wars between the ‘heroin families’
and no convictions; and in the past two decades, there
have been no arrests of senior figures in the heroin and
hashish trades.178 Officially recorded heroin seizures
have been insignificant in Mozambique.179 This analysis
stems from our interviews with a range of sources in
Mozambique, as shown in the examples put forward as
evidence of this ‘quid pro quo’ in this report.
Our sources suggest that any political protection that
might have existed during Chissano’s administration
also existed during Armando Guebuza’s, and may in
fact have increased. Guebuza became president in 2005
publicly visited MBS’s Maputo shopping centre twice
in his first term (on 22 June 2006 and for the official
opening on 8 May 2007). The US$32 million complex
was then the largest in Mozambique, and Guebuza
praised it as a model of private investment. MBS was
reported to have made a US$1 million contribution to
Guebuza’s 2009 electoral campaign.180
Officially recorded heroin
seizures have been insignificant
in Mozambique
Interventions by the US between 2009 and 2010 provide
some contemporaneous evidence that entrenched
corrupt relationships between the ruling party and
major drug traffickers were considered a serious concern.
In 2009 and 2010, Todd Chapman, chargé d’affaires
at the US Embassy in Maputo, alleged that MBS ‘has
direct ties to President Guebuza and former President
Chissano’.181 This was followed by the blacklisting of MBS
as a drugs kingpin by the US Treasury in 2010.182
Several informants characterised Guebuza’s
administration as one in which corruption in
Mozambique increased rapidly in scale and visibility,
with widely acknowledged links to organised crime.
Conservation activists, for example, described Guebuza’s
term as ‘devastating’ for wildlife and anti-poaching
endeavours. It is not clear to what extent this relates
to his specific style of leadership, or if it reflects the
cumulative pressure of various external factors, such as
the uptick in drugs trafficked in the southern route and
the surge in Asian demand for wildlife products.
Under the current president, Filipe Nyusi, there appears
to be a slight destabilisation of the ruling party’s
relationship with the major traffickers, discussed
further below. Nonetheless, in the following section the
‘symptoms’ of political protection for the Mozambican
transit heroin trade are described, or what could be
called the mechanisms for impunity. These have been
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 27
uncovered through numerous interviews in the north of
the country and from documentary research.
Political protection
The history of the heroin trade and the post-war
development of Mozambique’s criminal economy
already say much about the evolution of the connections
between the illicit economy and the political sphere in
the country. The questions examined here are, how has
each side benefited from this arrangement and what
evidence can be found for this?
That the MBS group is able to move illicit goods
through Mozambique’s ports unhindered comes from
several interviewees. Controversially, the scanners used
in all Mozambique ports were supplied by a company
that is owned by a FRELIMO holding company.183
The authors were told in two interviews with people
who had close associations with those working with
scanners in the ports (one in Maputo and one in Nacala)
that certain containers are never scanned – namely,
those imported by FRELIMO and those imported by
MBS or one of his associates (Moti or Rassul).184 (In
Nacala, we were told that containers filled with timber,
which is not connected to the MBS group but is a
source of funding for FRELIMO and party figures, are
also not scanned.)
The government has also been proven to have awarded
associates of MBS other significant and lucrative
privileges connected to Mozambique’s ports. A 2014
investigation by the Centro de Integridade Pública
(Centre for Public Integrity) in Maputo found that
the ruling party had been selling tax exemptions to
Mozambican companies owned by a number of traders
in Beira, Nampula and Nacala to import large volumes
of goods to be sold in their retail outlets.185 Among the
beneficiaries of this scheme, the investigation found, was
Momade Rassul, the businessman linked to the MBS
group of drug traffickers.
To do this, the government exploited Mozambican
Law 7/91, which grants political parties the rights to
import, with tax exemption, goods for political activities.
The party transmitted its rights to state-designated
‘economic agents’, such as Rassul. In exchange, such
agents paid money directly to the party, rather than to
the tax authority.186 Rassul Trading benefited heavily
from these exemptions, and documents show that the
company imported multiple containers of motorcycles,
freezers, tyres, school notebooks, and fabrics.187
The exemption scandal has not been directly linked to
the import of drugs, nor has it been publicly documented
that containers linked to the MBS group are not scanned.
But these accusations were made during interviews,
and well-informed respondents whom we spoke to also
linked the tax-exemption scandal to the general state
of exception applied to imports by politically connected
businessmen, and MBS in particular.
This impression that it is linked, however, was bolstered
by the description of Nacala Port as the personal fiefdom
of businessmen linked to illicit trades. The authors were
told in several interviews that Nacala was a major hub
because, in the words of a journalist interviewed for this
study, the heroin traffickers ‘control it – so they have to
use [that port]’.188 The same informant described the
appointment of customs and port officials as being
symptomatic of control exercised by senior party officials
in Maputo. ‘The head of Nacala Port is part of it … he is
always a senior, trusted person in the party. He always has
guns and money.’
Agents from Mozambique’s State Security and
Intelligence Service (known as SISE)189 were also allegedly
installed in the port, undercover, as customs officers. ‘They
are not permanent, they change often. When they leave
the post, they leave rich.’190 Another source confirmed
that, in general, customs officers have little leeway to do
their jobs effectively. ‘Customs officers cannot simply go
where they please at a seaport; they must get permission
from the port management to move around.’191
Furthermore, the traffickers are also said to have some
level of political protection on the cross-country road
network. At the start of the transit heroin trade and the
elite pact, some sources claim, heroin shipments along
the N1 road used to be accompanied by the police, so
that they could pass the checkpoints.192 Since then, road
protection has evolved – with the expansion of mobile
phone infrastructure and coverage – into a system of
remotely controlled protection. Informants said that
several of the main figures in the drugs trade had the
ability to contact people in Maputo – presumably senior
figures in the party or the police – if any of their road
shipments were searched or stopped, or they were able
to forewarn their contacts of upcoming shipments to
prevent this happening in the first place. A low-level
government official in Nampula, who had spoken to
people who were once involved in the heroin trade
and to a truck driver who had transported drugs from
Nacala, said:
28 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Nacala is very interesting because it is controlled
by [Mozambicans of Pakistani and Indian descent.
When they deliver the drugs to [Nampula] then their
trucks take them on to another place … FRELIMO and
the drug networks … do work together. For example,
Gulam [Moti] can use his trucks and no one can stop
that truck that goes to Maputo. If it is stopped, the
driver will phone. The police officer will be told that
he must let the truck go.193
When asked who in the government received the
money from this arrangement, he merely said, ‘The
money goes to positions higher than mine.’194
Evidence of an ‘elite pact’ can be found in the decadeslong
cover-up of the heroin trade in Mozambique.
The authors have found evidence that suggests that
government officials intervene to disguise the presence
of the heroin trade in the country. Primarily, this evidence
concerns discrepancies in the official documentation,
corroborated by interviews with law-enforcement officials
who have first-hand experience of the incidents.
A policeman based in a small town in Nampula Province
told the research team that he and his colleagues never
declare ‘heavy drugs’ (e.g. heroin and cocaine) because it
is established practice to keep these drugs for personal
sale and not let them enter the police seizure system.
If a drug seizure is declared at all, it will be declared as
cannabis sativa.
195 A more senior official stationed in the
same town confirmed that this practice was routine.196
A well-informed source who is familiar with routes
and locations in northern Mozambique told us that
heroin is an important source of income for police and
customs officers:
Heroin represents important income to police
and customs officials. When they find drugs and
the dealers, they negotiate with them and receive
[either] 1) [an] amount of money, 2) money and
some quantities of drug to sell them in Mozambican
market, or 3) they confiscate the drug and let the
dealers go.197
An official working in a state department with a
mandate related to drugs – one who played a key role
in generating official statistics – also claimed that their
office did not report the true type of drugs that were
seized. ‘Beyond changing the name,’ the informant told
us, ‘the police and customs officers don’t declare the
real quantities of drugs seized. In 2014, we found 56
packages of 50 kg of cannabis sativa, but when we took
the packages to be burned, we noted that the quantities
were not those declared.’198
This may just seem like petty corruption on the part of
low-level police and customs officers, but if one were to
do a reckoning of drug seizures reported in the press,
those reported in district or provincial reports, and those
reported in the interviews for this study, and compare
these with the official statistics, it reveals the systematic
suppression of data about heroin seizures at more senior
levels. Refer to Table 1, which shows the total heroin
seizures – according to various government sources –
nationally, and in Nampula and Pemba. In all the years
shown in the table, the seizures are tiny or non-existent.
Indeed, as the table shows, there are few cases of any
heavy drugs – such as cocaine, meth or mandrax –
having been seized in the Cabo Delgado Province from
2012 to 2016. Yet there are at least two documented
cases of police seizures of large amounts of heroin in the
Table 1: Mozambican seizures of heroin, 2012 to 2016 (volumes in grams)
Name of report institution 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
General Prosecutor (annual national report) 4 114 4 335 1 957 946 1 469
Gabinete Provincial de Combate a Droga
(Nampula)
30 – 40 50 486.70
Gabinete Provincial de Combate a Droga
(Pemba)
– – – – 2
Criminal Investigation Police in Nampula – – 24 capsule units – 486.70
Criminal Investigation Police in Pemba – 600 – – –
National Customs Services reports – – 1 000 and 61
capsule units
– –
Sources: General Prosecutor reports, Gabinetes Provinciais de Combate a Droga em Nampula e Cabo Delgado (Provincial Strategic
Plans to Fight and Prevent Drugs in Nampula and Cabo Delgado) and police data
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 29
north – these are recorded in the press and corroborated
through our interviews.
On 6 March 2013, Mozambican police searched a
Toyota Hiace (a small van) with Democratic Republic
of the Congo number plates trying to cross the border
from Tanzania at the Namoto border crossing in Cabo
Delgado Province.199 Hidden in the truck the police
found 600 kg of heroin packed in 5 kg bags. Despite this
heroin seizure being reported in the press,200 it is not
reflected in national or provincial statistics. A reliable
source told the authors that they had seen test results
from the Customs Department that confirmed it was
heroin, yet the drug was recorded as N-Acetylanthranilic
acid by the provincial authorities.201 And indeed, the
provincial records show that there was a 603.7 kg seizure
in 2013 – of N-Acetylanthranilic acid (see the table in
the annexe). Then in 2015, the newspaper Noticias ran
a story highlighting government information that 13 kg
of heroin had been seized in Montepuez.202 Likewise, this
seizure does not appear in the official records.
Similarly, in the Gabinete Provincial de Combate a
Droga document (Provincial Strategic Plan to Fight
and Prevent Drugs in Cabo Delgado, 2016–2020), there
are no heroin seizures registered in the whole of the
Cabo Delgado Province, from 2010 to 2016. Yet the
reports refer to the fact that in 2011 the Cabo Delgado
health authorities assisted and treated one heroin
consumer in Montepuez. And in the same document, in
a separate discussion, three arrests for heroin trafficking
are recorded. The presence of heroin traffickers and a
heroin user but the absence of any seized heroin do not
add up.
These discrepancies and oral testimonies suggest three
things are happening:
• National and provincial statistics are subverted,
possibly by actors in centralised statistical units.
• Drugs, mainly heroin, are being taken out of the
system by police or customs officials.
• Heroin is being misdeclared as other drugs by police
or customs officers.
Our local sources say that different incentives work
together to produce the final outcome: suppression of
evidence of the transit heroin trade in Mozambique. At
the national level, the incentive is to mask the trafficking
that the ruling party benefits from, but at the provincial
and district level more direct financial benefits from
corruption may provide adequate incentive – corruption
that it is politically expedient for more senior officials
to overlook.203
Our documentary evidence concerns events in the last
few years. However, listening to accounts from residents
of Cabo Delgado of earlier large hashish busts and the
hashish trade that used to be obvious along the coast in
the early 2000s, we suggest the possibility that some of
these seizures may in fact have been of heroin, and that
the ‘hashish’ trade may have become more hidden after
the government had to intervene to calm down upset
local residents.204
This suppression of information about the heroin trade
may go beyond protecting operators from media
and public scrutiny. One quid pro quo of the party’s
protection of the trade may be that heroin does not leak
out into the general drug market. Mozambique’s role
as a transit – rather than a consumer country – probably
also determined the original set of decisions around
protecting the trade (a situation that later became
path dependent). It does appear that rates of heroin
consumption are low in Mozambique, though the data
is quite sparse.
Another facet of the elite pact may be local investment:
many people we spoke to claimed that much of the
property boom in the north, and many luxury residential
and commercial properties in Maputo, had been funded
by drug money.
‘They sent guns to divide us,’ a
FRELIMO politician told one of
our informants. ‘Now we send
this drug to divide them.’
With few Mozambican heroin users on the streets, and
millions invested in local assets, it is easy for people
protecting the trade to argue that it is a victimless
crime – especially, they would argue, as heroin users
are considered to be found only in the wealthy Global
North – in other words, the states that once sought to
overthrow FRELIMO, that sold weapons to its enemies
and funded the devastation of the country during
the civil war. ‘They sent guns to divide us,’ a FRELIMO
politician told one of our informants, a former senior
policeman. ‘Now we send this drug to divide them.’205
30 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Yet the primary victims of Mozambique’s role as a heroin
corridor are not quite so far away. With a burgeoning
unga, woonga and nyaope problem in South Africa’s
townships, and gang wars over control of the drug trade,
many of them are to be found just across the border.
Historical consolidation with recent
evolution
In Mozambique, the findings suggest a close connection
between political figures in the ruling party and
traffickers, creating a level of protection and advantage
that closes the market off for other operators. But, just as
opposition parties are starting to make inroads and are
claiming key urban centres in Mozambique, the criminal
market shows signs of destabilisation.
The drug trade continues
under Nyusi but there is
seemingly less protection
for the major players
And it is a destabilisation, it seems, that has its
roots in the ruling party’s more tenuous position as
Mozambique’s dominant force following the secret
loans crisis206 and the withdrawal of budget support
in the context of consistently low global gas prices. In
January 2015, Nyusi took over as president, and his
moves since then have attempted to reverse some of
this centralisation and curb some of the more rapacious
illegal trading in the country. This has led to a loss of
influence for former president Guebuza because, with
his sidelining, MBS and his associates seem to be at a
greater distance from the party.
The drugs trade continues – perhaps even at higher
volumes – under Nyusi but there is seemingly less
protection for the major players. There are no reports
of Nyusi having the same personal links with MBS and
Rassul; party links seem to now be at lower and more
decentralised levels.
There is, perhaps consequently, also greater volatility
in the business of the kingpins. As mentioned above,
Momade Rassul was arrested in 2017 in Maputo and
charged with money laundering, illegal enrichment
and tax fraud,207 and later released on bail. Interviews
conducted for this study suggest there is growing
tension between the mayor of Nacala, Rui Chong Saw,
and Rassul over control of key pieces of land and their
development in Nacala.208
Further north, in Cabo Delgado, there are some claims
from residents that a group referred to locally as alShabaab209
is making a move into the drug market –
albeit in the cannabis trade210 – in coastal territory that is
key to the heroin traffickers. This group has moved into
towns in the north in the last three years, taking control
of existing mosques or establishing their own and
preaching an anti-state ideology.211 The government’s
response to the group has reportedly been heavyhanded
for a while, with the arrest and imprisonment
of the group’s leaders. This spilt out into open conflict
in October 2017, when members of this group stormed
a police station in Mocimboa da Praia (a port in the
north), ostensibly to free members who had been
imprisoned. The result was a prolonged firefight with
security forces.212
South Africa
History and networks
Drugs and drug traffickers have always been present to
some degree in South Africa.213 In the 1980s and early
1990s, heroin was trafficked through South Africa in
relatively small quantities, its use largely confined to a
small group of mostly middle-class, white, male drug
users who injected the drug, and who mostly sourced
their supply in Hillbrow, Johannesburg.
However, in the 1990s, with the country’s transition to
democracy and the liberalisation of the economy – and
changing social mores – the amount and type of illicit
drugs trafficked in and through South Africa grew, as did
local consumption markets. This was driven both by the
growth in the presence of international organised crime
in the country and the marketing of drugs across the
racial spectrum.214
In the last decade, methamphetamines, and recently
heroin, have become prevalent in South Africa. In about
2003, consumption of crystal meth (locally known as
‘tik’) took hold in Cape Town and soon spread to other
parts of the country. Tik is cheap, making it accessible
to lower-income markets and it soon became a serious
competitor to mandrax, and it remains popular. Tik is
linked to soaring rates of violence as a result of both
competition over the trade and crime committed
by users.215
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 31
Although heroin use grew after the lifting of sanctions
on South Africa and the relaxation of border control as
part of the democratic transition, the amount consumed
was relatively small compared with that of cocaine,
methaqualone and methamphetamines. Use has risen
dramatically, however, in all the major metros in the
last four years. This rise has been obscured, in public
debate, partly because it is being marketed as a new
drug – nyaope (Johannesburg) and unga (Cape Town –
also sometimes referred to as woonga). In Indian areas,
heroin is called ‘sugar’. Heroin use has exploded in small
towns, like Middleburg, along the road corridor from
Mozambique to Johannesburg, and a number of fatal
overdoses and a crime wave have accompanied this.216
As previously explained, this trade happens through
much more diverse routes and networks, and in
lower volumes, than the transit trade. In Pretoria
and Johannesburg, the secondary trade in heroin
is dominated by Tanzanian networks. Interestingly,
whereas ‘Nigerian’ is virtually synonymous with ‘drug
dealer’ in South Africa, Tanzanians involved in the trade
have kept a remarkably low profile for several decades.
According to interviews with people involved in heroin
rehabilitation, ‘Tanzanians have been running the show
in southern Africa since the beginning’.217
It appears that Tanzanians opened up the heroin market
in the country’s townships. Unga and nyaope were an
innovation in the drug market, in the sense that they
provided low-grade heroin mixed with a concoction of
different substances, which was cheap and could be
smoked. This way, these drugs broke into low-income
markets where there was an aversion to injecting.
Tanzanian networks in Gauteng are well organised, and
with the surge in use there is now a big market with
‘more than enough people making money, so that there
is no need for violence’.218 Originally, Nigerians traded
in heroin as well as their mainstay, cocaine, but now
there seems to be an agreement whereby they control
cocaine and the Tanzanians control the heroin market.
According to a Cape Town police officer, heroin was first
marketed in the Cape Flats in 2008 by the Americans
gang: ‘I had the feeling someone was testing the market,’
he said. This test was not hugely successful, and heroin
use did not take off until 2011 to 2013, when unga hit
the market.219 Tanzanian gangs have gradually become a
more powerful group in the Cape underworld, and now
they operate in the Cape Flats alongside the traditional,
local Cape gangs.220 When unga use became prevalent
on the Flats, it potentially eclipsed the tik crisis, which
has devastated poor areas in the city for the last decade.
To market unga, dealers in Pretoria, Johannesburg and
Cape Town have adopted a range of offers. They are said
to hand out free bags on Sundays. Then there is also the
use of ‘starter packs’ – a reward for frequent purchases.
In Pretoria, this deal started out with one free bag for
every four R30 bags bought; then, to deter customers
from shopping around with other dealers this changed
to two free bags for every seven bought, and then three
free bags after 10 purchases.221
Nyaope and unga are marketed at taxi ranks, at
informal markets, on street corners and in schools. One
community worker from Chatsworth, Durban, described
the usage of both heroin and nyaope in his area:
In Chatsworth and Phoenix we have more ‘sugars’
[the local street name for heroin] than Huletts [a
brand of sugar]. Its use is very rife – such that kids
at 12 years use sugars. Areas that were previously
known for mandrax are now seeing heroin-based
drugs start to emerge as the drugs of choice.222
This rise in heroin use can be seen in the escalating rates
of people seeking treatment for heroin dependency
(see Figure 1).
Figure 1: National trends in heroin treatment,
South Africa (1998–2016)
1 600
1 400
1 200
1 000
800
600
400
200
0
’98 ’00 ’02
y = 39.728x – 8.2131
’04 ’06 ’08 ’10 ’12 ’14 ’16
Number of people in treatment
Source: S Dada et al, South African Community Epidemiology
Network on Drug Use, Monitoring Alcohol and Drug Abuse
Trends in South Africa, Phase 35, Cape Town, 2014
32 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Although the scale of the secondary heroin market
is mostly underappreciated in South Africa (in part
because it is not widely understood that unga, woonga
and nyaope are all heroin-based drugs), the transit
heroin trade is even less known to the general public –
and to law enforcement, too, it appears. Seizures over
the last decade, however, indicate that the amount of
heroin being trafficked in South Africa has escalated.223
Reported heroin seizures since 1998 paint a picture of a
steep rise in trafficking since 2013. In 1998 the amount
of heroin seized in South Africa was 5.4 kg;224 by 2002
it had gone up to 15.02 kg; and by 2007 to 28.2 kg.225
During 2014/15 the police seized 212.36 kg of heroin; by
2015/16, the amount had risen to 344.75 kg.226
Seizures over the last decade
indicate that the amount
of heroin being trafficked in
South Africa has escalated
These seizures – and their growing scale – provide some
measure of the growth in heroin trafficking but they
do not provide a full picture of the trade. None of these
seizures had any effect on drug prices in South Africa,
indicating they were insignificant in terms of the total
amount being trafficked for domestic consumption. At
the same time, law-enforcement officials also believe
that the rate of heroin seizures from small-time dealers
or users may be undercounted because police do not
always identify nyaope and other adulterated versions as
heroin.227 Perhaps most importantly for understanding
the true dimensions of the trade, there have been no
seizures at the container ports, meaning that the true
picture of heroin exports remains very unclear.228
The use of South African seaports to export heroin had
not been documented until very recently. In June 2017
(as mentioned earlier in this report), South African police
in the Overberg region of the Western Cape, 250 km
from Cape Town, seized 963 kg of heroin, the largest
heroin seizure ever.229
Despite the repeated references in our interviews to the
use of Durban’s port to bring in drugs, including heroin,230
there have never been any major seizures of heroin
there. The authors were told that there is no big figure
controlling the port or ensuring protection for smugglers,
but rather that petty corruption and poor management
have allowed it to become an entry point. It is not clear
exactly which networks have interests in this port.
The Overberg seizure and an earlier seizure made at
Heathrow Airport of heroin trafficked on a flight from
South Africa231 may point to an increasing number of
Western European traffickers operating in South Africa.
One police officer interviewed claimed that certain
wealthy Europeans who have bought properties in
Gauteng and the Western Cape are operating under
the facade of corporate businessmen in order to traffic
in drugs:
They operate in the upper world and their pipeline
does not seem to be linked to the underworld
gangs. They fly under the radar and because of our
perceptions of who is involved in drug trafficking,
they often go undetected. We only know about
them by chance or because Interpol approaches us
about them.232
Often, these people are involved in the transshipment
of drugs into countries in Europe, and Canada and
Australia. The traffickers involved in the Overberg
shipment had strategically planned to operate in South
Africa because they were at less risk of arrest there and
because, according to law-enforcement officials, ‘with
the euro exchange rate, you can get better-quality
lawyers for cheaper’.233
Our interviews also suggest that the Cape gangs have
developed key (and corrupt) links to the management
of the port.234 This suggests the existence of – or the
possibility for – an overlap between the criminal
networks controlling the local consumption markets and
those that control the bulk transit trade.
In Cape Town, as noted earlier, Tanzanians are
considered a violent group in their own right; they also
pay for protection from other gangs.235 This appears to
have brought the Cape Flats gangs into the heroin trade,
which may compound both the local and international
aspects of South Africa’s role in the heroin trade. The
Cape gangs have partnerships with Russian, Chinese
and Nigerian organised-crime networks in South Africa,
who are ‘now dependent on maintaining relations with
the gang bosses to survive in the area’.236
Cape gangs are also suspected to be trying to build
their own links to external markets. This point was
supported by a former senior police officer who has
worked extensively on gangs and criminal networks
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 33
in the Western Cape, who said, ‘There is evidence that
some of the key gang leaders are travelling abroad
to form new international networks.’237 International
ambitions have been driven by increased organisation
as the local drug market has grown. To give one
example, Jerome ‘Donkie’ Booysen, the leader of the
notorious Sexy Boys gang, is said to have ‘brought a
certain level of administration and organisation to the
way the criminal network is run’.238
Political protection
The research did not turn up any direct links between
the heroin trade and the political establishment,
but there are long-standing allegations of political
protection of the South African drug trade more broadly,
and in particular of corrupt relationships between gang
figures and foreign mafiosos, and individual ministers,
senior policemen and even the ex-president himself.
As in the other countries discussed in this report, the
links between the drug trade and state officials are only
part of a broader picture of criminal penetration and
capture of state institutions. In South Africa, a number
of criminals in other illicit trades have been linked to
state actors who provide political protection. These
include alleged illicit tobacco kingpins Yusuf Kajee and
Adriano Mazzotti, alleged rhino horn smuggler Guan
Jiang Guang, and club and alleged drugs kingpin Mark
Lifman. In a recent exposé, long-time criminal Glenn
Agliotti is said to have been caught on tape telling a
selection of Johannesburg crooks that they can expect
to be protected because the former president, Jacob
Zuma, is ‘a gangster just like us’.239
But the biggest criminal racket in South Africa is not
linked to contraband at all, but rather to the extraction
of bribes, kickbacks, corrupt tender allocations and the
looting of state-owned enterprises, which have funnelled
perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars to the Gupta
family, close friends of the ex-president.
However, what is significant for the drug trade now
in South Africa is that the ANC, the ruling party, has
undergone a shift in leadership. This is causing huge
volatility in the underworld, as the legacy of the
weakening of state institutions combines with the
current destabilisation of a range of corrupt relationships
that formed under Zuma’s administration. The
symptoms are to be found in, among others, rising levels
of violence in nightclubs in the country’s two major
cities, and a massive rise in gang-related conflict.
In Johannesburg, the vacuum left by the arrest and
imprisonment of Czech mafioso Radovan Krejcir from
the underworld in 2016 has slowly been filled by other
actors linked to illicit tobacco, who had previously been
kept in check by a law-enforcement unit of the South
African Revenue Service. (This unit had been disbanded
under false allegations of illegal activities, after it began
investigations into the president and many of his allies,
including some of the criminal operators mentioned
above.240) With the disbandment of the unit, some
commentators have pointed to an upsurge in the illicit
cigarette trade, as criminals involved in this trade had
become more emboldened.
Part of this emboldenment has been the attempted
expansion by a specific group in Johannesburg into
control of the city’s nightclubs and the drug trade. The
illicit tobacco group appears to have three aims: to shift
traditional drug trafficking routes between Cape Town
and Johannesburg,241 to pit gangs in the Western Cape
against one another and take over their share of the
market, and, related to this, to use the large amounts
of cash made from their illicit tobacco trade to cut
prices of drugs and cigarettes in the Western Cape. In
Johannesburg, where they have been recruiting muscle
from Eldorado Park and Westbury, there has been an
upsurge in violence.242
At the same time, between 2016 and 2018 a war has
been going on in Cape Town between this group, Nafiz
Modack, a suspected extortion syndicate boss, and the
reigning club kingpin, Lifman. Recently, the authors
were informed that Lifman, who controlled the city’s
nightclubs for at least a decade, has been effectively
displaced by Modack, who some suspect is being
protected by police crime intelligence.243 Lifman also
appears to have once had high political connections: he
was photographed with a senior ANC official at Zuma’s
birthday celebrations.244
Modack also claims he is moving into the
Johannesburg market. The three-way competition
for nightlife security has become extremely volatile.
It has led to a series of shootings at venues in both
Cape Town and Johannesburg, and is said to be
the reason for the shooting of gang leader Jerome
Booysen at Cape Town International Airport and to a
spate of shootings in Westbury and Eldorado Park. In
the words of one journalist, ‘As part of the war, drugs
are being flooded into the market in quantities never
seen before.’245
34 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
A fragmented market in violent transition
One can characterise the criminal economy of South
Africa as being in the midst of a dramatic underworld
transition that is linked to criminal actors in several
places, but primarily Johannesburg and Cape Town. This
transition is a symptom of shifts in the make-up of the
upperworld, shifts which may be calling into question
the political protection that key actors have enjoyed for
around a decade. Although it would be an exaggeration
to suggest that the flow of heroin down Africa’s east
coast is the only factor at play, what is clear is that cheap
heroin is beginning to make its presence felt. Heroin is
displacing other forms of drug use in the Cape Flats – a
critical vector for nationwide drug use.
A certain level of stability in the underworld may have
been broken yet the future is uncertain, and South
Africa is in a very important interim phase, which makes
it easier for new entrants to muscle their way into the
market. This process is as violent as ever, if not more
so. The Global Initiative has sought to measure the
number of criminal assassinations – those carried out for
criminal, political or ‘business’ purposes – in South Africa
since 2000. It is a mark of the violence and instability
in South Africa’s underworld that assassinations have
soared since 2015 (see Figure 2). This is a reflection of
political instability, but also of a fight for control in the
underworld. What is important too is that recent data
reveals that assassinations have spread to many other
parts of the country.246
Figure 2: Hits in South Africa
(2000–31 October 2017)
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
’00 ’02 ’04 ’06 ’08 ’10 ’12 ’14 ’16
Source: Data from Global Initiative Against Transnational
Organized Crime
Understanding the impact and
implications of the regional
heroin trade
Development, democracy and the
drug trade
Too often, analyses of trafficking networks in Africa rely
on the banal trio of corruption, poverty and weak rule
of law to explain why transnational criminal activity
flourishes. There is seldom more differentiation of the
processes involved or explanation of how political
cultures and criminal markets interact in different
ways in each context. Yet customs officials who
take petty bribes to look the other way as a means
of supplementing a meagre income represent an
instance of corruption that, in order of magnitude, is
different from senior individuals within the political or
state administration who, for example, systematically
arrange for ports to be porous. Though the two forms of
corruption are often closely interconnected, accounts
that characterise both situations as organised crime
abetted by corruption and poverty fail to identify the
degree to which intertwined political economies of
crime develop and sustain themselves.
We also argue that traffickers benefit not only from
the lack of development in the region, but also from
its infrastructure improvements and economic growth.
Certainly, the dhow-based delivery system for drugs is
facilitated by the obscurity and remoteness of much
of the region’s long coastline. As mentioned earlier
in this report, there are dozens of small harbours and
islands that serve as landing points for heroin smugglers
using dhow routes to traffic drugs from the Makran
coast to the African shore. These movements are still
largely shaped by the monsoons and masked by regular
activities of ancient fishing villages and the enduring
small-scale dhow (licit) trade from Asia.
However, major trading centres in the countries along
the eastern African seaboard play a key role in this trade
too. In a globalised economy, and riding a boom driven
largely by Chinese investment and Asian, European
and North American demand for resources, they are
the exit point for much of the natural-resource wealth
of the interior, and the gatekeepers of imported goods
that supply the needs of millions of inland people. A
slew of multi-billion dollar projects are scheduled to
expand transport and trade infrastructure. These include
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 35
the modernisation and expansion of ports in Lamu,
Kenya, and Bagamoyo, Tanzania; facilities for extracting
gas in southern Tanzania and northern Mozambique;
and a number of energy-generation projects – these in
addition to the new Nairobi–Mombasa express railway,
which opened in 2017.
Such developments, rather than mitigating organised
criminal activities, have often exacerbated organised
crime by facilitating the transport of illicit goods through
infrastructure investments and by masking illegal
activity in the flurry of ‘boom town’ economies, often
along the coast. Licit and illicit businesses are integrated
throughout the region, a relationship between economic
liberalisation and organised crime typified by the rise
of ‘business-style’ traffickers with a diverse portfolio of
commercial concerns – and key political connections.
At the same time, organised crime has perverse effects
on local economies. Interview respondents lamented
the ‘bandit economies’, ‘vulture capitalists’, and the
phenomenon of seaside towns overrun with empty
hotels. Money laundered into businesses distorts the
market for other entrepreneurs who find it hard to
compete with businesses that have slush funds and do
not need to turn a profit. The money that is invested
locally – and not siphoned to tax havens – does not
benefit the many, or create a better environment for
business. The incentive of criminal actors to keep deep
container ports porous opens countries up to a wide
range of negative consequences of poor port security,
from the import of dangerous goods, like arms, and
counterfeits, which damage local industry, to the loss of
tax revenue.
The results of the distorted economies created by
these trades are visible everywhere in the north of
Mozambique, where, in the three hubs at the centre of
this commerce, stand many half-completed or glitzy but
empty hotels. For example, evidence of a recent property
boom is everywhere in Nampula: new supermarkets,
shops, buildings, hotels, guesthouses, restaurants and
bars. Yet, according to hotel workers, many hotels
consistently operate at 30% or 40% capacity.247 The same
phenomenon is apparent along Kenya’s coast around
Mombasa; it is damaging to the business prospects for
legitimate entrepreneurs.248 Sources also said that the
illicit economy – in which heroin plays a key part – has
driven rampant property speculation in Dar es Salaam.249
The heroin trade also has a strong relationship with
the finances of multi-party democracy. These findings
echo the conclusion of a recent book on mafias, which
concludes that mafia networks ‘thrive in democracies’,
albeit through different mechanisms.250
The drug trade picked up at
exactly the same time that
political parties began to need
more and more money
In many parts of the world, democracy is an increasingly
expensive endeavour. In East and southern Africa, where
many countries emerged from long periods of singleparty
rule in the 1990s, the drug trade picked up at
exactly the same time that political parties began to
need more and more money simply to compete in – and
win – elections. Since then, the cost of campaigning for
political office – and the performances that accompany
it – has escalated. As a recent insider account of party
political financing in South Africa concludes:
In the battle for political survival [in local
government], politicians make deals in order to
raise the resources they need to campaign. Once
they set off down this path [and the story recounts
how the pressures to do so are high], they soon
wade into a murky world of deals within deals that
become ever more complex in order to evade public
scrutiny. All of this is justified, on the face of it, by the
party’s interests or some greater good. But for many,
extraction of personal benefits or a facilitation ‘fee’ is
a short step behind.251
This phenomenon requires further study and analysis,
but the authors’ understanding is that it is closely
related to, more broadly, the rising cost of African
elections, the growing need for political slush funds
for ‘capital intensive’ campaigning, and the lack of
transparency about campaign financing.
These slush funds are by no means necessarily, or even
primarily, derived from illicit trades. They might be
created by donations from genuine businessmen, or
for incumbent political parties, by corruptly extracting
resources from the state itself. ‘We know that during
election campaigns, FRELIMO receives funds from many
illegal sources,’ one investigative journalist who closely
follows the drug trade told us.252 Indeed, several criminal
activities have been linked to party funding, such as
36 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
profits from tax exemptions and tax evasion, logging,
trade in rubies and grey goods, etc.253 ‘Funds from drug
traffickers are a part of this mix, but we cannot put a
figure to that and we cannot say that the majority of
funds for FRELIMO come from drugs.’254
Nevertheless, interviews across the region reiterated the
point that illicit funds, particularly from the heroin trade,
were valuable because they were ‘quick money’. A grand
corruption scheme might take months or even years
to pull off. A policy change or investment promised to
a legitimate businessman who backs an opposition
political party may require gaining cross-party
agreements that can be hard to deliver once in power.
But all officials need to do to facilitate the heroin trade is
to ensure a few things are not done: that trucks are not
stopped or containers are not checked. Although South
Africa demonstrates some of the same challenges with
relation to political-party funding as the other countries
examined, there is no evidence of a direct link between
the heroin trade and party funding.
Illicit funding is part of the way that the high costs of
election campaigns have been sustained and, by the
same token, is part of the reason why the barrier to
entry for new blood in the political system is raised.
When honest money cannot compete, then only people
who are already compromised will enter the political
race. Illicit funding helps entrench long-standing
ruling parties, and where there is no long-standing
party, it ties all parties to campaign donors who expect
favours in return.255 Capital-intensive election strategies
have also fostered a growing gap between political
parties and their rank and file, and have weakened
branch structures, which are no longer as relevant for
mobilising voters.256
All of these effects have undermined the wave of
democratisation that swept through the region in the
1990s. All come together in looking at how organised
crime affects the development of state institutions.
Effect on institutions
Our interviews repeatedly turned up examples of the
intentional sabotage of state institutions in order to
facilitate organised crime, or at least they informed the
notion that institution building had suffered severely
through the influence of criminal networks.
South Africa provides a prime example of how the
effects of corruption, weak accountability and organised
crime reinforce one another. In 2014 the Public
Protector released a report detailing the extent to which
President Zuma and his administration had formed
corrupt relationships with a small group of people
outside government. Foremost among these is the
Gupta family, owners of a number of businesses. The
report revealed that they used their influence over the
president to control the operation of certain government
departments and manipulate decisions made by
individual state employees and the running of SOEs.257
This phenomenon has been termed ‘state capture’.
The parts of the state that have been most affected
by state capture are SOEs, which have been fleeced
through irregular tender processes while other
crucial management functions have been neglected,
sometimes to the point that they face bankruptcy.
The criminal-justice system has also been thoroughly
eroded by the appointment of political lackeys who
were part of Zuma’s patronage network to key positions.
Once in place, they were deployed to either prevent
investigations, or to initiate cases against people who
threatened Zuma’s network. Highly effective special
investigation units were dismantled. Experienced people
who were determined to investigate others accused
of corruption were sidelined, persecuted or falsely
charged themselves.258
The sum effect of these moves is that the criminaljustice
system under Zuma was substantially
reconfigured in order to selectively serve a purpose that
is counter to its mandate – namely, to let crime flourish.
Any staff who were unwilling to take part in corrupt
activities would avoid embarking on investigations
or prosecuting cases that might upset their political
principals. In this situation, it is only the media and the
courts that provide any semblance of accountability.259
In this context – where the criminal-justice system
is both weakened and compromised – addressing
organised-criminal activity through law enforcement is
almost impossible.
In Mozambique, the opposite manifestation is also
apparent:260 authorities that might play a role in keeping
the drug trade in check are undermined through
neglect. Notwithstanding the difficulties of enforcing
rule of law in a poor country with a bureaucracy that has
been severely compromised by war, law-enforcement
agencies appear to be severely neglected and
underfunded for a country that has seen high economic
growth rates for two decades.261
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 37
Similarly, political weight is not thrown behind laws that
exist to curb criminal activity. This is not centrally related
to the heroin trade, but rather to the degree to which
individuals in the government have become implicated
in criminal activities, and to which the party’s own system
for generating funds relies on a lack of the rule of law.
The ease with which illicit funds can be laundered and
can leave the country is a good example of this. In 2013,
the Mozambican Parliament approved Law No. 14/2013
against money laundering. This law gave the judicial
system substantial powers to access information about
financial transactions. According to an acting judge,
this legal framework ‘is probably one of the best in the
region, but agencies and regulators do little to enforce
it’.262 Money laundering and cash transfers abroad have
been a problem in Mozambique since the mid-1980s.
Currently, despite existing legislation relating to banking,
a retired bank employee told us that ‘if anyone wants
to make a deposit, nobody would ask him where the
money comes from’.263
In April 2017, the annual report of the General Attorney
declared that the Mozambican state had suffered
financial losses of 1.88 billion meticals (US$30 million)
from money-laundering operations. According to
one anti-corruption analyst: ‘Legislation that could be
used to tackle money-laundering, illegal enrichment,
or seize assets is not used. There is no political will or
encouragement to do so, because politicians or persons
of high social status fear, if it is employed against
criminals, the day will come when it is employed
against them.’264
It also seems that most government efforts to improve
Mozambique’s border control or law-enforcement
capacity – such as the installation of customs
scanners part owned by the ruling party’s holding
company (discussed above) – have been incidents of
‘false compliance’. In deeply implicated states, such
investments in security are too easily a fig leaf to conceal
failure to ensure better criminal control.
People who use heroin and their access
to treatment
This research suggests there is an urgent need to
understand the prevalence, scale and public-health
implications of heroin use across the region.
From our interviews, and this is corroborated by other
studies, we know that in the 1980s heroin use was
isolated to a few places, with a small number of users.
Then, local users were primarily people in contact with
tourists in Zanzibar and Mombasa, and, in South Africa,
primarily white, middle-aged people who inject drugs
(PWID), many of them in Hillbrow, Johannesburg.
There is an urgent need to
understand the implications of
heroin use across the region
There was a big uptick in heroin supply in East Africa
– and then an escalation in use – in the mid-1990s.
This first shift was accompanied by a move from
‘brown sugar’ to ‘white crest’ (different types of heroin),
indicating that heroin supply had moved from East
Asian sources to the Afghan heroin route, which now
dominates the African coast.265 From tourist beach
towns, heroin spread to major ports, like Mombasa
and Dar es Salaam, and then inland, along coastal
roads and to inland towns. For example, in 2001 in
Tanzania, injecting drug users were found to be a major
concern in inland Arusha and an emerging problem in
Mwanza.266 And in 2002, a study in Dar es Salaam found
that 75% of multi-drug users were using heroin, and
18.3% of the sample were injecting drugs.267
The surge in supply and then transit repeated itself in
the early 2000s, though sudden increases in use vary in
their timing, linked as they are to the development or
expansion of a local market. In the mid-2000s, heroin
use in the Kenyan counties of Kwale, Kilifi, Mombasa
and Lamu was rife, and heroin users could also be found
in Kisumu, a city in the west of Kenya. In South Africa,
it was only around 2010 that heroin use began to shift
from being predominantly a white, middle-class drug
problem, and started becoming prevalent in poor, black
and Indian townships.
Table 2 indicates the latest figures for the number
of people who inject drugs in the four coastal transit
countries under study. A number of discrete issues
should be noted. Firstly, in Mozambique, all data is
based on one study using a relatively small sample.
Secondly, the figures for Tanzania cover only the
mainland, and not Zanzibar, which has a separate
health department and drug authority. Although we do
have figures for Zanzibar, the estimate of PWID is quite
outdated (198 in 2006).
38 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Injecting drug users are only a subset of total heroin users.
Most heroin users in the region smoke heroin, often mixed
with other drugs, particularly tobacco and cannabis.
However, over the medium term many users will begin
injecting, which carries much higher health risks, because
without public-health interventions (including awareness
raising, but often including the provision of free supplies)
drug users share equipment. Injecting brings considerably
higher public-health risk, raising the risk of spreading
diseases such as HIV and HCV.
Injecting drug use is already present in all the centres
of highest heroin use. Kenya experienced a shift from
smoking to injecting in around 2005. It appears South
Africa is currently undergoing such a shift.
As shown in Table 2, HIV and HCV rates are high among
PWID in the region. Although all four countries provide
ARVs, not all offer or run harm-reduction approaches
for drug users, which have been shown to reduce the
incidence of HIV and HCV, and to increase adherence to
treatment. Currently, only Kenya provides treatment for
HCV, and even then only to a very small number of people
in Nairobi.
Table 3: Adoption of harm-reduction programmes
in public healthcare systems282
Country Needle and syringe
programmes (NSP)
Opioid substitution
therapy (OST)
Kenya Yes Yes
Tanzania Yes Yes
Mozambique No No
South Africa No No
Source: Interviews with public health professionals or civil society
organisations in Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique and South Africa
in September and November 2017.
Across the region, the practice of ‘flashblood’ (East
Africa) or ‘bluetoothing’ (South Africa) has also
been documented, though it is not believed to be
widespread. This practice involves a person injecting
the blood of another intoxicated user into his or her
own veins, in order to ‘share’ the drugs. This is a very
ineffective method of becoming intoxicated, but one
that greatly increases one’s chance of contracting
infectious diseases. In fact, one public-health activist
believes that in South Africa the phenomenon was
driven by the media, with sensationalist stories of the
effectiveness of ‘bluetoothing’ having driven users to
experiment with the practice.283
However, as concerning as these figures are, and
while the political response to heroin trafficking
remains so dire, several East African countries have
shown some progressive leadership in their publichealth
responses to injecting drug use. A large
body of evidence suggests that needle and syringe
programmes (NSP) and opioid substitution therapy
(OST) are the most effective approaches for reducing
HIV and HCV infection rates among people who inject
drugs, and for encouraging adherence to treatment
for HIV and tuberculosis. These approaches have
been adopted and embedded in health responses
in Tanzania and Kenya (see Table 3). The coverage
rates of these services are still low, according to World
Health Organization indicators, but their adoption is
encouraging, and provision appears to be growing in
both countries.284
In February 2011 in Tanzania the first OST and
community-based comprehensive NSP were
established at the Muhimbili National Hospital
and by NGO Médecins du Monde, respectively. This
made Tanzania the first country in sub-Saharan
Table 2: People who inject drugs, and HIV and HCV prevalence (Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique,
South Africa)
Country Adult population
using heroin (%)
Estimated
number of PWID
(2015)
National HIV
prevalence rate
(%)268
HIV prevalence
among PWID
(%)269
HCV prevalence
among PWID (%)
Kenya 0.21270 54 262 5.40 18.30271 70.30272
Tanzania 0.12273 32 351 4.70 36.00274 75.50275
Mozambique 0.01276 1 971 12.30 43.50277 69.50278
South Africa 0.21279 75 701 19.00 14.00280 60.00281
Note on sources: This table compiles information from multiple sources using data from different time periods and estimates using
diverse methodologies (see the notes). As such, it should be treated as illustrative only.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 39
Africa’s to offer community-based NSPs. There are
currently three OST programmes on the Tanzanian
mainland (two in Dar es Salaam and one in Mbeya)
and another is due to open in Mwanza in early 2018.
Zanzibar, which has a separate health ministry and
drug authority, also runs a methadone-based treatment
programme and a needle-exchange programme. Across
Tanzania, there are now 4 681 users on state-assisted
methadone programmes285.
In 2012, Kenya introduced NSPs and opioid substitution
therapy to help reduce HIV transmission among
PWID.286 In 2015, nearly 90% of PWID reported using
a clean syringe last time they injected compared to
51.6% in 2012.287 Kenya now has five (soon to be six)
facilities providing methadone, which are low-threshold
(meaning less demanding to the user) and nonresidential,
which increases the chances of adherence
as well as being more cost-effective. While these
programmes receive substantial international funding
(including through PEPFAR and the Global Fund), there
is also national ownership, with all staff, procurement
and maintenance of facilities provided by the Kenyan
government. Kenyan civil-society organisations provide
follow-up care and psychosocial interventions. Kenya
also has a particularly progressive attitude to drug
users who are in conflict with the law (though its legal
framework remains punitive) and prisoners are entitled
to receive methadone while in jail.
This situation is not as progressive if one goes
further south, however. Mozambique does not offer
methadone, although civil-society activists are
advocating for it. While South Africa has more than 80
private and public treatment centres,288 the government
has not adopted a methadone treatment model, and
the only treatment option available is abstinence.
Treatment facilities in South Africa, although much
more numerous than in other countries studied in this
report, still fall short of demand.
A 2017 article by a number of public-health and
policy experts noted: ‘Some recent South African
policy documents have called for such an approach.
In practice, however, enforcement and punishment
remain the dominant response, with the country only
paying lip service to the provision of harm-reduction
programmes.’289
Private medical aid pays for 28 days in a treatment
centre, but does not cover OST. The average price of
treatment is R1 500 ($130) a month to start, then R700
a month for maintenance. This is far above average
international pricing ($100 a year).
Law enforcement does not
create an enabling environment
for harm-reduction approaches
to succeed
Despite the heartening trend towards putting drug
users’ rights and access to health services at the centre
of drug treatment approaches in several places, there
remain serious gaps in the response. Firstly, there is the
issue of scale and reach in all locations. Law-enforcement
approaches are also out of sync with the harm-reduction
approach (where this is implemented). By imposing
harsh sentences for drug users, law enforcement does
not create an enabling environment for harm-reduction
approaches to succeed. There is also a significant lack
of strategic information. There needs to be systematic
collection of data on what drugs are being used in the
region, how they are being used, how many people are
dependent, and the broader trends in drug use in the
region. Without this data, countries struggle to tailor their
programmes to their specific problems and to make
cost-effective policy interventions.
Communities affected by drugrelated
violence
Several communities in areas with large consumer
markets are affected by violence linked to the drug
trade. For example, Mombasa residents say that local
gangs have mushroomed over the last few years
to give protection to heroin barons.290 These gangs
have been involved in turf wars and in eliminating
anti-drug activists. A local drug-use expert claimed
there was a relationship between these gangs and
broader insecurity problems in the area. The Mombasa
Republican Council, a violent secessionist group, and
local politicians use muscle from these gangs, and
the gangs recruit from al-Shabaab deserters, who
have expertise in firearms.291 Drug traffickers also hire
indiscriminately from among the unemployed in
Mombasa’s slums, and so-called informal security actors
compete fiercely for employment in the drug economy
as scouts, bodyguards and peddlers.292
40 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
When job opportunities are more scarce – such as after
election periods, or when drug barons are imprisoned
– these ‘violent entrepreneurs’ become predatory and
turn to extortion and robbery in the local community.
At the same time, and in the midst of widespread
impunity for the people who organise and profit
the drug trade, lynching of drug users by anti-crime
vigilante groups has also become common. As one
report puts it:293
Having realized that they cannot capture powerful
drug lords, vigilante groups systematically targets
drug addicts … a number of addicts who had
received treatment were lynched after having
been caught committing petty crimes such as
mobile phone theft. Carrying out public lynchings,
the vigilantes announced, ‘This is how [we] will be
dealing with drug users that are stealing.’294
Meanwhile, in South Africa, as mentioned, use of
nyaope and unga has also led to an increase in crime.
Nyaope addicts resort to mugging, theft of copper
cables and other criminal activities to finance their
habit. Most significantly, however, two factors have
served to greatly increase levels of violence in gangcontrolled
areas. The first was a flood of guns into the
criminal market in Cape Town (sold from the police
armoury to gangsters beginning in 2010), the second
being a series of dramatic gang wars over drug turf.
The Cape Town murder rate spiralled upwards from
around 2011 and has only recently stabilised – albeit
at extremely high levels, making the city one of the
most violent in the world, on a par with several Latin
American capitals. The most recent homicide figures for
2016/17 show a recorded rate of 63 deaths per 100 000
citizens – compared to 42 in 2009/10. The Cape Town
homicide rate is double the national average.295
These drug-related wars have claimed the lives of many
involved – as well as those of bystanders. In the Cape
Flats, it is common for large numbers of gang members
to fight openly on the streets using an array of weapons,
and many adults and children are killed by stray bullets.
Gang wars also affect people’s ability to access services.
Schools on the Cape Flats close for weeks at a time
when it is deemed too dangerous for their pupils to
walk to school, and gangs often deny access to certain
areas to ambulances when they are engaged in a
firefight. And even if they do not directly threaten these
medical staff, often there is not enough police capacity
to safely escort them to do their work.
Such violence should be understood as an impact of
the drug trade – though not one whose answers lie in
increased law enforcement or punitive measures for
street-level dealers.
Enhancing the regional policy
discussion and response
This report has traced the growth of an integrated
regional trade in heroin destined for developed-country
markets, and how it became enmeshed with local
politics over time. It is a long-standing phenomenon,
but one that has undergone a rapid evolution in the
last five years. The discussion has shown how, arguably,
the trade has been intimately bound up with political
financing, and has been facilitated by stability and
rapidly growing economies. This does not imply a call
for a turn towards one-party rule or authoritarianism, or
against infrastructure development. Both development
and multi-party democracy are to be welcome and
supported in the region, but it does need to be
recognised they bring greater vulnerabilities for illicit
trafficking along the coast. It is a classic dilemma
thrown up by globalisation – that economic growth
and increased flows of goods and money between
regions (or development success, depending on one’s
perspective) are bound up with serious risks.
Law enforcement will have to
cooperate and work with a
range of other actors, so that
illicit trades can be diminished,
and not just displaced
The heroin economy is exerting a profound impact
on governance and development, and it is being left
almost entirely unchecked. The fact that organised
criminals have been able to amass so much wealth and
influence over the last three decades has, itself, severely
compromised criminal-justice institutions, to the extent
that they are unlikely to act against the heroin trade (or
other illicit trades). Mounting an effective response is
made even more complex because of the integration
of these countries into a regional criminal economy.
Integration leads to interdependence – in other words,
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 41
effects in one place manifest, in various ways, in
other locations.
The upshot is not that enforcement is undesirable
but that political incentives have to change to give
law enforcement the ‘licence’ to act, and then these
criminal markets have to be analysed across borders.
Law enforcement will have to cooperate and work
with a range of other actors, so that illicit trades can be
diminished, and not just displaced.
As well as lacking an effective law-enforcement
response, most countries in the region lack a vibrant
public discussion and documentation of the effects
of organised crime on their society. Or they lack an
articulated moral code that condemns the involvement
of powerful figures in illicit activity, one that could
motivate for real accountability. Or they lack a policy
debate about how to tackle these forces. Or they lack all
of these things.
Civil society therefore has a key role to play, in exposing
the extent of trafficking and its connection to politics, in
advocating for evidence- and rights-based public-health
responses, and in advocating for holistic responses for
communities caught up in the violence of the trade.
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful for the enormous contributions
made by Julius Kaka and Jenni Irish-Qhobosheane,
as well as other researchers who have asked not
to be named. Joe Hanlon was especially useful in
Mozambique, and Carina Bruwer provided crucial
research inputs with a literature review of the heroinsmuggling
economy. We would also like to thank the
staff at the Global Maritime Crime Programme of
the UNODC for their expert and generous assistance.
In several cases, due to the sensitivity of the issues
involved, colleagues have requested that their names
be withheld. We are very grateful for their contributions
all the same. The team would also like to thank the
many people who made time to talk with us. This
applies in particular to several law-enforcement officials,
who showed a strong commitment and openness in
engaging with us. It is again a demonstration that there
are many people across the region who are strongly
committed to ending trafficking and organised crime.
Sebastian Ballard provided expert assistance with the
map contained in this report. We are also thankful
to Tuesday Reitano and Iris Oustinoff for all their
support during the course of the research.
42 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Annexe
Interview breakdown
Role/occupation
Kenya
Uganda
Tanzania
Mozambique
South Africa
Seychelles
Totals
Law enforcement, including maritime 8 15 13 8 12 2 58
Wildlife experts, environmentalists 3 5 0 1 0 0 9
Religious leaders 1 0 2 6 1 0 10
Media 11 5 0 6 0 0 22
Government officials, incl. customs and ports
and international organisations
8 7 8 14 8 2 47
Private sector, including arms trade 7 2 0 1 3 0 13
Researchers, academics, professionals 3 9 0 1 5 0 18
Transport (taxis, buses, maritime transport) 2 9 1 0 0 0 12
NGOs and civil-society organisations 4 3 3 0 6 0 16
Judiciary, including prosecutors 3 0 0 4 0 0 7
Drug users, traffickers, activists 4 0 0 6 9 3 22
Politicians 1 0 3 2 0 0 6
Totals 55 55 30 49 44 7 240
present. In each of these situations, state actors are seldom
neutral players and are key in providing protection for some
or many criminal groups to operate.
At one end of the spectrum, a highly consolidated market
would display features such as a single or limited number of
criminal actors, strong protection by (some) state institutions
of these actors, and a strong (including violent) response
to outsiders who seek to break into the criminal market.
Generally, consolidated markets show lower levels of violence,
although selected and targeted assassinations may be used
as an internal form of regulation.
Criminal market consolidation
and fragmentation
In exploring the heroin trade in Southern and East Africa,
we employ the concept of criminal market consolidation.
The nature and presence of organised crime – and its
connections to the state – are often a feature of the degree
to which any criminal market is managed or controlled. That
level of control can be understood as the degree to which
either a small number of key players dominate the market
or many different and competing criminal actors may be
Interviewees by role or occupation
Politicians – 3%
Drug users – 9%
Judiciary and prosecution
authorities – 3%
NGO’s and CSO’s – 7%
Transport industry – 5%
Researcher or academic – 7%
Private sector – 5%
Law enforcement – 24%
Wildlife or environment official,
activist or expert – 4%
Religious leaders – 4%
Media – 9%
Government – 20%
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 43
At the other end of the spectrum, highly fragmented
markets are those that are easily accessible by multiple
criminal actors. Such markets could be described as
loosely controlled, providing relatively easy access for new
criminal actors. In such cases, market participants may
suggest that there is space in the market for new players.
Loose or fragmented markets may be characterised by
high levels of violence, particularly if a squeeze on supply
or demand occurs, thereby increasing competition
between participants.
Criminal markets are seldom static. Highly consolidated
markets may fragment under certain circumstances, such as
the removal of key criminal actors. Fragmented markets may
consolidate if one or two groups accumulate resources and
the capacity for violence.
Although terms such as ‘consolidated’ or ‘fragmented’ can
never entirely capture the complexities of criminal markets,
they do provide a general description to help understand the
functioning of any market.
Several important questions about criminal markets are
useful to help elucidate the state of a local criminal economy.
Although it is not always possible to ask these directly of
all participants, answers to the following five questions
provide a useful indication of the extent of fragmentation
or consolidation:
Is it possible for new criminal actors to enter into a local
market?
Consolidated and tightly controlled criminal markets will
reject newcomers, while fragmented or less well-controlled
markets are more likely to accommodate new arrivals.
Is violence highly targeted at specific individuals within
the criminal economy, or is violence more general and
widespread?
Targeted, carefully controlled or limited violence often
denotes a relatively controlled criminal economy, whereas
high levels of seemingly random violence (such as gang
wars) suggest more fragmented cases where different
groups are engaged in turf conflicts. Violence that is hidden
(or not reported on by the media) often denotes a highly
consolidated and controlled market with state involvement.
Is it easy to name key groups or individuals in a particular
geographic locality or is organised crime seen as the result
of a complex network of individuals?
Individual names identified as gang bosses over long
periods of time generally suggest a higher level of
consolidation, whereas a sense that organised crime
constitutes a complex and changing network suggests a
higher level of fragmentation.
What role do state actors play in providing protection to
some actors and not others?
State actors may often be key in ensuring a consolidated
market, given that systems of protection may be well
established and there is an ‘understanding’ between
criminal actors and the state, not only to enrich individual
officials, but also to reduce violence. In fragmented
markets, different elements of the state may side with and
protect different criminal actors, ensuring a multiplicity of
different players.
Who controls the key infrastructure necessary for the
criminal market – and how?
All criminal markets have key sets of choke points, or
gateways, the control of which provides enormous power
over other operators and in the market itself. A consolidated
market will generally have strong control over market
infrastructure (e.g. ports, customs and territory where
commodities are sourced), whereas a fragmented market
may have multiple sources of control.
More detail on the assessment framework can be found in
the Global Initiative’s publication, Development responses to
organized Crime: An analysis and policy framework.296
Drug categories seized in Cabo Delgado (2012–2016), according the 2014 Gabinete Provincial de
Combate a Droga report
Drug 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Cocaine – – 0.048 g 2.0 g 2.0 g
Hashish – – 13 g – –
Heroin – – – – –
Khat – – 40.1 kg – –
Mandrax – – – – –
Amphetamine – – 2.12 kg – –
N-Acetylanthranilic acid – 603.7 kg – – –
Cannabis sativa 583.33 kg 166.16 kg 1 163.50 kg 983.17 kg 1 510.96 kg
44 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
Notes
1 A Cole, Heroin trafficking in the Indian Ocean: Trends and
Responses, paper for Galle Dialogue, 1–2 December 2014.
2 UNODC, UNODC World Drug Report 2015, Vienna:
UNODC, Preface; UNODC, Afghan opiate trafficking
through the Southern Route, Vienna: UNODC.
3 The economics of this are clear: in Pakistan, a gram of
heroin costs approximately US$3; in Kenya, the cost is
around US$20; in the UK, US$61; and in Denmark US$213.
See drug prices listed on Havoscope.com. (These prices are
as of 16 November 2017.)
4 UNODC, UNODC World Drug Report 2017, Booklet 3,
Vienna: UNODC.
5 Several East African countries have shown some
progressive leadership in their public-health responses to
injecting drug use. Both Kenya and Tanzania (including
Zanzibar) have placed harm reduction at the centre for
their response.
6 Nyaope is a cocktail of various drugs and other ingredients
that has become widespread in South Africa; unga is a
highly addictive heroin-based drug.
7 Guns were sold from the police armoury to gangsters
beginning in 2010. See C Dolley, Western Cape cop,
gun dealer arrested in massive firearms probe. News24,
10 October, 2017.
8 The most recent homicide statistics for 2016/17 show a
recorded figure of 63 deaths per 100 000 citizens –against
a figure for 42 in 2009/10. The Cape Town figure is double
the national average. This data is from the Institute of
Safety Governance and Criminology at the University of
Cape Town. It draws on data from the South African Police
Service, but because city boundaries do not match police
ones, it has to be recalculated.
9 C Aucoin and Z Donnenfeld, Tackling heroin trafficking
on the East African coast, ENACT Policy Brief, issue 4,
April 2018
10 And beyond: many other countries along the southern
route are affected by these dynamics.
11 Several groundbreaking academic works have led the
way and highlight the methodological challenges
involved. See, Frederico Varese, The Russian Mafia: Private
protection in a market economy, Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2001.
12 A good overview of different approaches can be found
in Klaus von Lampe, Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal
Activities, Criminal Structures and Extra-Legal Governance,
Los Angeles: Sage, 2016, pp. 36-55.
13 For example, a process including representatives from
major development agencies has highlighted the
importance of including calculations of the illicit economy
in decisions around development funding and political
engagement. See Tuesday Reitano and Marcena Hunter,
The Crime-Development Paradox: Organised Crime and
the SDGs, ENACT, Continental Report 2, February 2018.
14 There is strong consensus on this from criminologists. See
Tim Newburn, Criminology, London: Routledge, 2007,
pp. 947-971.
15 The Ugandan fieldwork explored the linkages between
criminal economies in coastal countries and the interior,
but did not reveal a substantial amount about the
interior heroin trade. As such, Uganda does not feature
prominently in this report.
16 The Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) is a 31-nation
naval force that has been patrolling the Indian Ocean in
international waters since 2015.
17 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017.
18 Interview, border agents, port officials and shipping
company staff September 2017, Durban, South Africa.
19 J Wright, Transnational organized crime in eastern Africa:
A threat assessment, Vienna: UNODC, 2013.
20 UNODC, UNODC World Drug Report 2017, Booklet 3,
Vienna: UNODC.
21 See Drug prices listed on Havoscope.com. These prices are
as of 16 November 2017.
22 Interview, senior Pakistani counter-narcotics officials,
Peshawar, Karachi and Islamabad, November 2017.
23 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017.
24 Ibid.
25 Interview with a senior military source, Nairobi, Kenya,
2 August 2017. Interview with a major in the Kenya
Defence Forces, Nairobi, Kenya, 26 August 2017. See
also Journalists for Justice, Black and white: Kenya’s
criminal racket in Somalia, 2015, https://www.jfjustice.net/
downloads/1457660562.pdf.
26 For example, criminals take advantage of Kenya’s role
as the regional financial hub – with its 43 licensed
commercial banks, deep regional networks, hundreds
of microfinance and mortgage finance institutions, and
forex bureaux and hawallahs. Interview, economist at
the University of Nairobi, Nairobi, Kenya, 19 September
2017.
27 Analysis compiled from multiple interviews in Mombasa,
Nairobi, and in the Uganda–Kenya border region, August to
September 2017.
28 Interview, former driver for a drug-trafficking organisation,
Kampala, Uganda, 23 August, 2017; also, interviews
conducted in the Uganda–Kenya border region, August to
September 2017.
29 Interview, former drug courier, Kampala, Uganda,
23 August 2017.
30 See Mombasa container terminal at https://www.kpa.co.ke/
OurBusiness/pages/mombasa-container-terminal.aspx.
31 Interviews with workers at the Port of Mombasa, August
2017.
32 Interview, officials from the Kenya Maritime Authority,
Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 45
33 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017.
34 Interview, officials from the Kenya Maritime Authority,
Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
35 Interview, academic and practitioner in drug rehabilitation,
Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
36 A dry port is an inland port connected directly by road or
rail to a seaport; it is used for the transhipment of goods
to other destinations. Dry ports may also have facilities for
storage and consolidation of goods, and customs clearance
services. The purpose of a dry port is to relieve the pressure
on space and facilities at its corresponding seaport.
37 Zanzibar was under the Omani Sultanate from 1698, then
was a British Protectorate until 1890, and after a brief
reversion to Omani rule in 1963 followed by independent
statehood, it formed a political union with mainland
Tanganyika in 1964, creating the modern United Republic
of Tanzania. Today a separatist movement advocates for
Zanzibari independence.
38 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017.
39 The city hosts the East African Community. From 1994
to 2015, Arusha also hosted the International Criminal
Tribunal for Rwanda.
40 Interview, official from an anti-narcotic unit, Nairobi, Kenya,
25 August 2017.
41 Interview in Dar es Salaam, September 2017.
42 Informal report provided to the Global Initiative against
Transnational Organized Crime (GI) by analyst working for
an intergovernmental organisation, October 2017.
43 Not to be confused with Pemba Island, Zanzibar.
44 Interview, Christian religious leader, Pemba, Mozambique,
12 September 2017; Interview, law-enforcement
official with poaching expertise, Maputo, Mozambique,
11 September 2017; interview, Muslim religious leader
in Cabo Delgado Province, Pemba, Mozambique,
13 September 2017.
45 Interviews in the north of Mozambique with religious
leaders, journalists, government sources and people linked
to the trade, September 2017.
46 This information is derived from interviews, including
with people living in Nacala and Nampula, and who have
come very close to the trade and its players. However,
it is also confirmed in diplomatic cables from Todd
Chapman, chargé d’affaires at the US Embassy in Maputo,
2007–2010, published on WikiLeaks. As well as Mohamed
Bachir Suleman, he cites Gulam Rassul Roti, Rassul
Trading, Grupo ARJ and the Ayoob family. From WikiLeaks,
25 Jan 2010, Maputo 000080, https://wikileaks.org/plusd/
cables/09MAPUTO1291_a.html.
47 Interview with senior police officer, Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, 29 September 2017; interview, senior lawenforcement
officer, Seychelles, 17 October 2017;
interview, international law-enforcement official, Dar es
Salaam, Tanzania, 18 September 2017.
48 Interviews in the north of Mozambique with religious
leaders, journalists, government sources and people linked
to the trade, September 2017. These estimates also align
with information contained in a report by Joseph Hanlon
for the GI.
49 GI observations and research conducted in the
north of Mozambique in August 2017. This was
also discussed during an interview with a Christian
religious leader, Pemba, Mozambique, 12 September
2017; interview, investigative journalist, Nampula,
Mozambique,16 September 2017; interview, government
official, Nampula, Mozambique, 16 September 2017.
50 Multiple interviews conducted and coordinated by GI in
Nampula, September 2017.
51 Report prepared for the GI by Joseph Hanlon.
52 These are estimates based on seizures documented in the
South African media in 2017.
53 Draft report of the ESAAMLG high level mission to the
Republic of Mozambique, 26–28 July 2017, Eastern
and Southern African Anti-Money Laundering Group,
http://esaamlg.org/userfiles/ESAAMLG-ANNUALREPORT-2016-17.pdf.
54 For example, heroin was found in a petrol tank of a Toyota
Prada in March 2016; a truck was stopped with 145 kg of
heroin packed in 1 kg bags at the Golela border post with
Swaziland on 4 May 2017; and a similar amount was found
in a truck at the Kosi Bay border post on 12 June 2017.
Both border posts are on rural roads running from the
south of Mozambique to South Africa.
55 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017. This interviewee
said that Cape Town’s importance lies in the fact that the
port’s role is to ‘switch oceans’ between the Indian and
the Atlantic.
56 Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Polokwane, Durban, Lanseria,
Pilanesberg, Port Elizabeth, Uppington, East London, Oliver
Tambo International and Mpumalanga.
57 Richards Bay, Durban, East London, Ngqura, Port Elizabeth,
Mossel Bay, Cape Town and Saldanha Bay.
58 L Rondganger, Harbour’s scanner exposes smuggling, IOL,
19 October 2015, https://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/
harbours-scanner-exposes-smuggling-1932356.
59 S Haysom and M Shaw, Location, location, location: The
settling of organised crime in Bedfordview, South African
Crime Quarterly, 59, 2017.
60 The trucking industry is highly competitive and there are
a significant number of transport and logistics companies
– ranging from large corporations with massive fleets of
trucks to small operators. The latter have to cut costs to
compete. In this context, some trucking companies are
vulnerable to trafficking networks that want them to
transport their illicit goods. There are also some trucking
companies that have links with organised-crime networks
and are set up specifically to transport illicit goods.
46 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
61 Not all the private vehicles necessarily pass through the
actual border post and some of the vehicles, particularly
if 4x4s, can enter through the borderline. In northern
KwaZulu-Natal, there is a 78-km stretch between South
Africa and Mozambique that is separated by only a cattle
fence. This borderline has a number of crossing points
that can be navigated using a 4x4 and that have for a
number of years been used by criminal networks involved
in cross-border crimes. Likewise, near the Mananga border
post and along a stretch of borderline between South
Africa and Swaziland, there are a number of informal gates
that are used by criminals for trafficking people, drugs
and counterfeit goods. There are also reports of people
crossing some of these borderlines on foot with drugs.
These are then picked up by vehicles and transported to
the next destination point inside the country. One crime
intelligence police officer interviewed said this kind of
foot traffic was common in the Kosi Bay area – interview,
crime intelligence officer, Richards Bay, South Africa,
4 September 2017.
62 See S Christie Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard: Life
among the stowaways, Cape Town: Jonathan Ball
Publishers, 2017, for a narrative description of this smallscale
heroin economy and the journey of drug mules
between Dar es Salaam and Cape Town and other South
African ports.
63 Interview, NGO director involved in heroin rehabilitation
since the 1990s, Pretoria, South Africa, 24 October 2017.
64 Interviews in Maputo, Mozambique, September 2017.
65 There have, however, been only two reported seizures
of heroin destined for export. One was the Overberg
seizure described in the text. And in 2009, 150 kg of
heroin was intercepted in a shipment of tourist souvenirs
at Heathrow Airport, London, on a flight from South
Africa; the trail was traced back to Durban and then
Mozambique, where the South African organised-crime
unit, the Hawks, said the heroin had been packed with
the curios. See South African Hawks in drugs bust, BBC,
16 September 2016, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/
africa/8259456.stm.
66 T Kubheka, Mbalula committed to fighting corruption at
OR Tambo airport, Eyewitness News, 22 July 2017, http://
ewn.co.za/2017/07/22/mbalula-committed-to-fightingcorruption-at-or-tambo-airport.
67 Initially incorrectly identified in the media as cocaine. See
Caryn Dolley, Police make massive R500m cocaine bust
in Overberg town, News24, 22 June 2017, http://www.
news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/police-make-massiver500m-cocaine-bust-in-overberg-town-20170622.
68 The seizure seems to have happened entirely by accident.
The container was being transported and the load shifted;
farmworkers began to repack the container when they
found some cases of wine had been replaced by heroin.
The seizure was made on the Belgian-owned Eerste Hoop
wine estate, and was intended for shipment to Antwerp,
Belgium. See Aron Hyman, Heroin-smuggling plot ‘foiled
by sharp-eyed workers on Cape wine farm’, Sunday Times,
23 June 2017, https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/2017-06-
23-heroin-smuggling-plot-foiled-by-sharp-eyed-workerson-cape-wine-farm/.
69 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Cape Town, South
Africa, 26 October 2017.
70 Interview, veteran seafarer with detailed knowledge of
the shipping trade in East Africa and the Horn of Africa,
Mombasa, Kenya, 24 September 2017; report compiled
by Joseph Hanlon for the GI – drawing on interviews in
Maputo, September 2017.
71 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Cape Town, South
Africa, 26 October 2017.
72 UNODC, Afghanistan Opium Survey 2017, https://www.
unodc.org/documents/crop-monitoring/Afghanistan/
Afghan_opium_survey_2017_cult_prod_web.pdf.
73 N Gilman, J Goldhammer and S Weber (eds), Deviant
globalization: Black market economy in the 21st century,
New York: Continuum Press, 2011.
74 See the Annexe, under ‘Criminal market consolidation’ for
information on how these determinations were made.
75 Interview, lawyer and human-rights activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September, 2017.
76 Interview, senior journalist for a leading Kenyan newspaper,
Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
77 B Sanga and P Beja, Curtain falls on former Kanu Coast
tycoons, The Standard, 15 January 2017, https://www.
standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000229903/curtain-falls-onformer-kanu-coast-tycoons.
78 Interview, anti-corruption activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September 2017.
79 Kenya’s former internal security minister, George Saitoti,
named several of these figures in Parliament, drawing
on an intelligence report provided to him by then US
Ambassador Michael Rannenberg. Saitoti was later
killed in a helicopter crash outside Nairobi. See Six Kenya
MPs named in drug baron scandal, The Daily Nation,
22 December 2010, http://www.nation.co.ke/news/politics/
Six-Kenya-MPs-named-in-drug-baron-scandal/1064-
1077186-hwjiroz/index.html.
80 L Bagnoli and L Bodrero, Kenya’s drug barons, Correctiv,
16 April 2015, https://correctiv.org/en/investigations/mafiaafrica/articles/2015/04/16/kenyas-drug-barons/.
81 The declaration was made on 1 June 2011 by President
Obama and reported to Congress under Section 804(a)
of the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act,
21 USC 1901-1908 (the Kingpin Act), See https://www.
standardmedia.co.ke/article/2001228327/drug-baronsexposed-why-uhuru-and-raila-allies-are-not-sleeping-easy.
82 Government of Kenya, Interim report on drug
trafficking investigations, 2011, https://www.scribd.com/
doc/49074255/Kenya-Police-Report-on-Drug-TraffickingInvestigations.
83 Interview, lawyer and human-rights activist, 27 September
2017, Mombasa, Kenya.
84 P Gastrow, Termites at work: Transnational organized crime
and state erosion in Kenya, International Peace Institute,
2011, https://www.ipinst.org/images/pdfs/ipi_epub-kenyatoc.pdf.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 47
85 Interview, anti-drug-abuse activist, Mombasa, Kenya,
24 September 2017.
86 Interview, anti-corruption activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September, 2017.
87 M Dimova, A new agenda for policing: Understanding the
heroin trade in eastern Africa, presented at the European
Consortium for Political Research Conference, University
of Glasgow, 3–6 September 2014, http://ecpr.eu/filestore/
paperproposal/9e9dd3da-27fa-42cb-96c6-0bc8b5639c99.
pdf.
88 Comments from an expert source; see also media articles
quoted below.
89 L Bagnoli and L Bodrero, Kenya’s safe haven, Correctiv,
16 April 2015, https://correctiv.org/en/investigations/mafiaafrica/articles/2015/04/16/kenyas-safe-haven/.
90 P Gitau, How Italian Mafia gained control of Malindi,
The Standard, 3 July 2012.
91 G Rubino and C Anesi, 2015. Cosa Nostra Diamonds,
Correctiv, 16 April 2015, https://correctiv.org/en/
investigations/mafia-africa/articles/2015/04/16/cosa-nostradiamonds/.
92 There have been a number of seizures of drugs at Jomo
Kenyatta International Airport and Moi International
Airport. In January/February 2017, a woman was arrested
at Moi International Airport headed to Abidjan, Ivory
Coast. Another arrest of a frequent traveller to Dubai
was made. They were in possession of heroin valued at
10 million Kenyan shillings. In March 2017, the Nigerian
National Drug Law Enforcement Agency arrested
Roland Chukwudi Tochukwu, 37, with 2.045 kg of heroin
imported from Nairobi. Two individuals in possession
of narcotics were arrested at the Murtala Muhammed
International Airport in Lagos with 2.045kg of heroin
brought in from Nairobi. In the same month, the Kenya
Revenue Authority intercepted 5 kg of heroin concealed
in packages of turtle artefacts at Jomo Kenyatta
International Airport.
93 Multiple interviews in Mombasa, September 2017.
94 Interview, anti-drug-abuse activist, Mombasa, Kenya,
24 September 2017.
95 Interview, prominent coastal politician, Mombasa, Kenya,
25 September 2017.
96 Interview, anti-corruption activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September 2017.
97 Ibid.
98 Interview, investigative journalist, Mombasa, Kenya,
24 September 2017; interview, senior journalist for
a leading Kenyan newspaper, Mombasa, Kenya,
25 September 2017.
99 E Oduor, Is Kenya set for most expensive elections? The
East African, 22 May 2017, http://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/
news/Millions-of-dollars-at-play-as-Kenyans-go-to-thepolls/2558-3937572-as8pr8/index.html.
100 Interview, politician, Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
Higher figures have been quoted elsewhere in the media.
101 Millions of dollars at play as Kenyans go into their most
expensive election yet, The East African, 22 May 2017,
http://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/news/Millions-of-dollarsat-play-as-Kenyans-go-to-the-polls/2558-3937572-as8pr8/
index.html; Kenya poll one of the most expensive in
the world, The Nation, 17 July 2017, http://www.nation.
co.ke/news/Kenya-holds-one-of-the-most-expensiveelections/1056-4018144-10vpg41/.
102 Interview, politician, Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September
2017.
103 Interview, academic and practitioner in drug rehabilitation,
Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
104 Interview, former senior member of the judiciary, Nairobi,
Kenya, August 2017.
105 MP’s two brothers seized, The Nation, 6 January 2006,
http://www.nation.co.ke/news/1056-101438-mfgiv3z/index.
html.
106 Family heads to court over officer killing, The Nation,
2 April 2015, http://www.nation.co.ke/news/Family-headsto-court-over-officer-killing/1056-2674608-12w69fk/index.
html.
107 Interview, anti-corruption activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September 2017.
108 Interview, lawyer and human-rights activist, Nairobi, Kenya,
27 September 2017.
109 Interview, senior police officer, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
29 September 2017.
110 Interview, former government official, Zanzibar, Tanzania,
21 September 2017; Interview, drug abuse NGO worker,
Zanzibar, Tanzania, 22 September 2017; interview, exheroin
user, Zanzibar, Tanzania, 22 September 2017.
111 Interview, senior police officer, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
29 September 2017.
112 Interview, investigative journalist, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
19 September 2017.
113 Interview, anti-drug abuse activist and NGO coordinator,
Zanzibar, Tanzania, 21 September 2017.
114 Ibid.
115 Multiple interviews in South Africa, September–October
2017.
116 Interview, drug-abuse-oriented NGO, Pretoria, South Africa,
24 October 2017.
117 S Christie, Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard: Life among
the stowaways, Cape Town: Jonathan Ball Publishers, 2017.
118 While the transition to a market economy began with
a 1986 adjustment plan agreed with the International
Monetary Fund, the legislative apparatus for privatisation
was put into effect only in 1992, the same year that
multi-partyism was restored and trade unions were made
autonomous.
119 M Lofchie, The political economy of Tanzania: Decline and
recovery, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
2014.
48 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
120 Interview, investigative journalist, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
19 September 2017.
121 H Gray, The political economy of grand corruption
in Tanzania, African Affairs, 114/456, 2015, 382–403;
A Adreoni, Anti-Corruption in Tanzania: A political
settlements analysis, Working Paper 001, Anti-Corruption
Evidence, 2017.
122 D Paget, Tanzania: Shrinking space and opposition protest,
Journal of Democracy, 28:3, 2017, 153–167.
123 D Paget, Dancers, branches, stereos and choppers: Party
finance and capital-intensive campaigning in Tanzania,
paper presented at the 60th Annual Meeting of the
African Studies Association, Chicago, November 2017
(forthcoming and not for distribution).
124 E Babeiya, Electoral corruption and the politics of elections
financing in Tanzania, Journal of Politics and Law, 4:2,
2011.
125 D Paget, Dancers, branches, stereos and choppers: Party
finance and capital-intensive campaigning in Tanzania,
paper presented at the 60th Annual Meeting of the
African Studies Association, Chicago, November 2017
(forthcoming and not for distribution).
126 H Gray, Industrial policy and the political settlement
in Tanzania: Aspects of continuity and change since
independence, Review of African Political Economy,
40:185, 2013.
127 D Paget, Dancers, branches, stereos and choppers: Party
finance and capital-intensive campaigning in Tanzania,
paper presented at the 60th Annual Meeting of the
African Studies Association, Chicago, November 2017
(forthcoming and not for distribution).
128 Interview, investigative journalist, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
19 September 2017.
129 Interview, senior police officer, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
29 September 2017.
130 Interview, investigative journalist, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
19 September 2017.
131 Republic of Tanzania, Tarifa ya hali ya dawa za kulevya ya
mwaka, 2014.
132 Ibid.
133 Both Jakaya and Ridhiwani Kikwete have denied these
allegations. Our information comes from multiple
interviews in Dar es Salaam and Stone Town. Christie
reports a drug shortage in the heroin houses of Dar es
Salaam at the time – see S Christie, Under Nelson Mandela
Boulevard: Life among the stowaways, Cape Town:
Jonathan Ball Publishers, 2017. Also see media reports,
such as Ridhiwani’s China arrest is a lie, The Citizen,
5 August 2014, http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/national/
JK--Ridhiwani-s-China-arrest-is-a-lie/1840392-2408656-
kbeq5j/index.html.
134 Interview, official working at Dar es Salaam Port, Dar es
Salaam, Tanzania, 21 August 2017.
135 Interview, retired government official, 22 August 2017,
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
136 The general elections of 2015 were set to be the closest for
the ruling party. Due to internal party factionalism within
CCM, which saw the Kikwete camp eliminate Edward
Lowassa, the favourite, from the race, John Magufuli, a
relatively unknown figure not considered to be a party
heavyweight, was put forward as the CCM’s presidential
candidate. He ran on a platform of anti-corruption,
and won.
137 Police, celebs named in drug ring, The Citizen, 3 February
2017, http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/Police--celebsnamed-in-drug-ring/1840340-3797944-p1qr4w/index.
html.
138 Interview, religious leader involved in civil-society response
to drug abuse and drug trafficking, Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, 10 October 2017. The GI was told the Interfaith
Council is building on a history of cooperation between
religious groups, which has been important in the past,
particularly in fraught electoral periods, as a means of
preventing or calming intergroup conflict – an important,
though poorly understood, aspect of the local politics in
Tanzania.
139 Interviews in Dar es Salaam and in South Africa,
September/October 2017.
140 Interview, international law-enforcement official, Dar es
Salaam, Tanzania, 18 September 2017
141 Lowassa is a veteran Tanzanian politician who was
Prime Minister between 2005 and 2008 under President
Kikwete’s reign. He was forced to resign due to a fraud
scandal. Nonetheless, he had a substantial support bases
within the party and external financial backers. While
he had been – reportedly – promised that he would be
the next CCM leader and so the country’s next President,
Kikwete blocked his nomination for party leadership at an
early stage of the process on technical grounds. As a result,
Lowassa left the CCM and joined the main opposition
party, Chadema.
142 M Collord, Tanzania – Where President Magufuli’s political
and economic strategy meet, Presidential Power, 2017.
(These limiting measures have not been linked to the drug
trade as such, but rather to constraining the private sector
and regaining control over party-owned properties and
other funds.)
143 Interviews, experts on Tanzanian politics, Dar es Salaam,
Oxford and Nairobi, September–October 2017.
144 Interview, Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
145 Interview, UN agency official, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
20 September 2017.
146 In March 2017, Makonda was also at the centre of a public
scandal when CCTV footage showed he had stormed a
radio station with armed policemen and assaulted staff
when they had refused to air footage that maligned one
of the suspects in the anti-drugs crackdown. See Makonda
in hot water over night Clouds raid, The Citizen, 20 March
2017, http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/Makonda-in-hotwater-over-night-Clouds-raid-/1840340-3856500-gakd6sz/
index.html.
147 D Paget, Tanzania: Shrinking space and opposition protest,
Journal of Democracy, 28:3, 2017, 153–167.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 49
148 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, 18 September 2017.
149 Comments made by practitioners working with drug
users in Dar es Salaam at our expert group meeting,
13–14 November, 2017, Nairobi; interview with anti-drugabuse
activist and NGO coordinator, 21 September 2017,
Zanzibar, Tanzania.
150 Interview, journalist with sources in these locations
involved in or linked to Tanzanian heroin networks,
20 September 2017, Cape Town, South Africa.
151 Interview, two senior police officers, Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, 29 September 2017.
152 Interview, UN agency official, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
20 September 2017.
153 Interview, 24 October 2017.
154 Interview, investigative journalist, Maputo, Mozambique,
10 September 2017.
155 Interview, employee in licit business owned by drug
trafficker, Beira, Mozambique, 17 September 2017.
156 Momade Rassul and his wife, Saidata, built a school
for Guebuza’s wife’s foundation. Saidata Rassul hosted
a reception for the first lady in her Maputo house on
27 August 2007. A journalist interviewed by the GI
obtained a copy of Saidata Rassul’s speech at the event.
157 This information is contained in a CV belonging to Rassul
that was provided to the GI by one of his competitors.
158 See Mozambique Prosecuting Authority press release,
Procuradoria Provincial da República – Nampula,
Comunidado de Imprensa n° 02/PPRN/2017, http://
weeklyxpose.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/
Mozambique-Prosecuting-Authority-release.pdf.
159 Multiple interviews in Nampula, September 2017.
160 Interview, investigative journalist, 16 September 2017,
Nampula, Mozambique.
161 A type of printed fabric worn as a sarong, dress or skirt.
162 Interview, former employee in licit business owned by drug
trafficker, Beira, Mozambique, 17 September 2017.
163 L Nhachote, Traficante de droga procurado em Portugal,
Zambeze, 1 October 2008, http://manueldearaujo.
blogspot.co.uk/2008/10/traficantes-de-droga-tm-estatuto.
html; and http://muliquela.blogspot.co.uk/p/mohamadkhalid-ayoob-momad-aiuba-irmao.html.
164 Ibid.
165 Momed Khalid Ayoob was arrested on 1 December
2010 by the Swazi Police in possession of R18 million
($2.6 million) in banknotes. He was taking the money from
Mozambique to Dubai, in violation of both Mozambican
and Swazi exchange legislation.
166 Nacala was more generally identified with the heroin trade
during interviews with heroin users who had become
addicted through their work in the hotels in the town,
which is where a lot of heroin is sold. Interview with drug
user, Nacala, Mozambique, 25 August 2017.
167 Interview with former employee in licit business owned
by drug trafficker, Beira, Mozambique, 17 September
2017; interview with investigative journalist, Nampula,
Mozambique, 16 September 2017. The journalist’s
information came from truck drivers, taxi drivers, port
workers, customs officials and agents of the SISE,
Mozambique’s official intelligence agency.
168 Interviews, scanner company employees, Nampula and
Maputo, 17 September 2017.
169 Interview, political scientist, Maputo, Mozambique,
10 September 2017; this claim is also made by Joseph
Hanlon, in a report prepared for the GI based on interviews
in the country.
170 Interview, senior staff member of a drug policy NGO,
Maputo, Mozambique, 10 September 2017; interview
with former customs official, Maputo, Mozambique,
10 September 2017.
171 These markets include kidnapping, heroin, money
laundering and smuggling of grey goods.
172 Report prepared for the GI by Joseph Hanlon.
173 G Wannenburg, Africa’s pablos and political
entrepreneurs: War, the state and criminal networks in
West and southern Africa, Johannesburg: South African
Institute of International Affairs, 2006.
174 Interview, political scientist, Maputo, Mozambique,
10 September 2017.
175 L Nhachote, Leis que levaram ao fuzilamento de Gulamo
Nabi, Canal de Mozambique, 22 March 2007, http://macua.
blogs.com/moambique_para_todos/2007/03/leis_que_
levara.html; see also Condenados a morte seis bandidos,
Noticias, 4 April 1983, http://www.mozambiquehistory.net/
justice/tmr/19830404_6_condenados_a_morte.pdf
176 Reported in Savana online, 20 October 2009. This is no
longer available online.
177 Report prepared for the GI by Joseph Hanlon.
178 Ibid.
179 This analysis stems from our interviews with a range of
sources in Mozambique, as shown in the examples put
forward as evidence of this ‘quid pro quo’ that follow.
180 These figures were reported in Savana online, 20 October
2009 and in Noticias, 23 June 2006, AIM English 9 May
2007. Articles are no longer available online.
181 Chapman also claimed MBS had ‘connections in the
Ibrahim Dawood international drug syndicate’. Then, on
1 June 2010, Obama designated MBS as a ‘drugs kingpin’,
making it illegal for US citizens, US companies and
businesses that operate in the US to conduct financial or
commercial transactions with him or his three businesses,
Grupo MBS, Kayum Centre and Maputo Shopping Centre.
From WikiLeaks, 16 November 2009, Maputo 001291 and
25 January 2010, Maputo 000080; https://wikileaks.org/
plusd/cables/09MAPUTO1291_a.html.
182 The US Department of the Treasury stated that ‘Mohamed
Bachir Suleman is a large-scale narcotics trafficker … [he]
leads a well-financed narcotics trafficking and money
50 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
laundering network in Mozambique’. See US Department
of the Treasury press release, ‘Treasury sanctions entities
owned by drug kingpin Mohamed Bachir Suleman’, TG729,
1 June 2010.
183 Article 17 of Decree 30/2001 of 15 October does not
allow a Public Administration agent to participate in
administrative procedures or in contractual acts, either
public or private. See M Mosse, Procurement Público e
Transparência em Moçambique, Centro de Integridade
Pública Moçambique, December 2007, https://cipmoz.
org/images/Documentos/Anti-Corrupcao/21_CIP_
NEWSLETTER_Set-Dez_2007.pdf.
184 Interview, former employee in licit business owned by
drug trafficker, Beira, Mozambique, 17 September 2017;
interview, senior manager for major corporate in Maputo,
Maputo, Mozambique, 11 September 2017.
185 Centro de Integridade Pública Moçambique, Carta do
Comité Central confirma negócio ilícito do Partido no
Poder, July 2014, http://www.cip.org.mz/historico/index.
asp?sub=iafl.
186 As documented in a letter issued on 10 January 2014
by FRELIMO’s Department of Finance, the party gave
authorisation to a private company to pay out a FRELIMO
invoice and ordered the Millennium Bim Bank to receive
money from the private company.
187 Traders awarded these privileges have also sold them
on to others. Documents in the possession of the GI
reveal that Momede Rassul (Rassul Trading) had received
permission to import diverse goods and then sold them
to Hassan Gulam (Maiaia Grupo), another trader in Nacala,
in 2010.
188 Interview, investigative journalist, Nampula, Mozambique,
16 September 2017. His information came from truck
drivers, taxi drivers, port workers, customs officials and
SISE agents.
189 SISE is Mozambique’s official intelligence agency, which
operates inside and outside Mozambique. It has the
normal functions that any intelligence agency has, but it
is also used by the ruling party to monitor and control the
political opposition and journalists.
190 Interview, investigative journalist, Nampula, Mozambique,
16 September 2017. His information came from truck
drivers, taxi drivers, port workers, customs officials and
SISE agents.
191 Informal report provided to the GI by an analyst working
for an intergovernmental organisation, October 2017.
192 Interview, political scientist, Maputo, Mozambique,
10 September 2017; also, J Hanlon, report prepared for the
GI, 2017.
193 Interview, government official, Nampula,
Mozambique,16 September 2017.
194 Ibid.
195 Interview, police officer, Nampula Province, 20 August
2017.
196 Interview, senior police officer, Nampula Province,
20 August 2017.
197 Interview with a well-informed source, Nampula,
Mozambique,19 August 2017. Also confirmed by interview
with police officer, 20 August 2017, Nampula, Mozambique.
198 Interview, government official, 29 August 2017, Cabo
Delgado Province.
199 The two drivers of the vehicle, men from Guinea-Conakry,
were arrested. According to the police spokesperson in
Cabo Delgado, the truck had left Nairobi, Kenya, and the
intended destination of the heroin was South Africa.
200 Polícia apreende 600 kg de heroína em Cabo Delgado,
O Pais, 7 March 2013, http://opais.sapo.mz/index.php/
sociedade/45-sociedade/24463-policia-apreende-600-kgde-heroina-em-cabo-delgado.html.
201 Interview with a well-informed source, Nampula,
Mozambique, 19 August 2017.
202 Cabo Delgado: Mueda e Meluco líderam a produção de
soruma, Noticias, 13 June 2015, http://www.jornalnoticias.
co.mz/index.php/provincia-em-foco/37998-cabo-delgadomueda-e-meluco-lideres-na-producao-de-soruma.html.
203 This is the authors’ conclusion based on several interviews
in Mozambique.
204 Interview, Muslim religious leader, Cabo Delgado Province,
13 September 2017.
205 Interview, retired policeman, Maputo, Mozambique,
12 September 2017.
206 In 2013-14 Mozambique took US $2 billion in loans,
organised in secret by Credit Suisse and the Russian bank
VTB, ostensibly to create a coastal protection system. A
subsequent audit by Kroll showed that more than half
of the $2 bn could not be accounted for, suggesting a
substantial amount of money was diverted to the accounts
of senior Frelimo people. Donors have since retracted
budget support, triggering a financial crisis for the
Mozambican state. The government has barely collaborated
with attempt to investigate the scandal. The public
debate has, understandably, focused on grand corruption,
cronyism in Frelimo, and public financial management. See
Kroll. 2017. Independent audit related to loans contracted
by ProIndicus S.A., EMATUM S.A. And Mozambique Asset
Management S.A. Report prepared for the The Office of the
Public Prosecutor of the Republic of Mozambique.
207 Mozambique Prosecuting Authority, Procuradoria
Provincial da República – Nampula, Comunidado de
Imprensa n° 02/PPRN/2017, http://weeklyxpose.co.za/
wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Mozambique-ProsecutingAuthority-release.pdf.
208 Interview, former employee in licit business owned by drug
trafficker, Beira, Mozambique, 17 September 2017.
209 They are known locally as ‘al Shabaab’, but do not appear
to have any link to the Somali political and military group
of the same name. Some people claim they are foreigners,
but, in reality, the phenomenon appears to be homegrown
– most, if not all, the members are Mozambican.
210 Interview, Christian religious leader, Pemba, Mozambique,
12 September 2017; interview, Muslim religious leader,
Pemba, Mozambique, 13 September 2017.
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 51
211 Our interviews reveal that locals are very concerned, as the
group promotes a harsh version of Islam at odds with local
values (for instance, they do not believe in the education
of women or use of the formal health system) as well as
with local traditions of religious co-existence. Residents
also reported to us that they were armed (with knives
and bludgeons) and violent. Interview, Christian religious
leader, Pemba, Mozambique, 12 September 2017;
interview, Muslim religious leader, Pemba, Mozambique,
13 September 2017.
212 See E Morier-Genoud, 2017, Why Islamist attack demands
a careful response from Mozambique, The Conversation,
18 October 2017, https://theconversation.com/why-islamistattack-demands-a-careful-response-from-mozambique85504?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=twitterbutton.
213 Historically, cannabis has always been widely available
in South Africa, and has been both grown and traded
domestically and for markets in Europe and North
America. Cannabis has always been trafficked extensively
across the borders between South Africa and Lesotho.
In the 1980s, South Africa was one of the biggest
global consumers of mandrax (the base of which is
methaqualone).
214 Previously, drug use had been more or less differentiated
among the country’s racial groups.
215 S Howell et al, The wrong type of decline: Fluctuations in
price and value of illegal substances in Cape Town, South
African Crime Quarterly, 54 (2015).
216 J Boshoff, New killer drug, Middelburg Observer, 16 June
2014, https://mobserver.co.za/12405/new-killer-drug/;
Middelburg situated on popular drug route, Middelburg
Observer, 25 July 2017, https://mobserver.co.za/69733/
middelburg-situated-popular-drug-route/.
217 Interview, NGO director involved in heroin rehabilitation
since the 1990s, Pretoria, South Africa, 24 October 2017.
According to the same source, Tanzanians arrived in South
Africa already enmeshed in the heroin economy and
set up business discreetly, learning from the mistakes of
Nigerians in Johannesburg. They didn’t concentrate the
trade in one area, but instead made heroin available in
many areas. After the xenophobic attacks of 2009, to make
themselves less conspicuous they deployed local runners,
usually people who were already dependent on heroin.
218 Interview, NGO director involved in heroin rehabilitation
since the 1990s, Pretoria, South Africa, 24 October 2017.
219 Interview, senior police officer, Cape Town, South Africa,
8 September 2017.
220 Interviews, various members of several community policing
forums on the Cape Flats in gang-controlled areas in Cape
Town, 25–26 October 2017.
221 Interview, NGO director involved in heroin rehabilitation
since the 1990s, Pretoria, South Africa, 24 October 2017.
222 Interview, anti-drug activist, Durban, South Africa,
3 September 2017.
223 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Cape Town, South
Africa, 26 October 2017; interview, international drug
control official, Pretoria, South Africa, 27 October 2017.
224 UNODC, South Africa Country Profile – Part 1, October 1999.
225 Eastern and Southern African Anti Money Laundering
Group, ESAAMLG Typologies Working Group, Laundering
the proceeds of illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs and
psychotropic substances, ESAAMLG Conference, Mauritius,
8 September 2011.
226 See South African Police Service Annual report 2015/16,
https://www.saps.gov.za/about/stratframework/annual_
report/2015_2016/saps_annual_report_2015_2016.pdf.
227 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Cape Town, South
Africa, 26 October 2017.
228 Interview, former general in the police force, Cape Town,
South Africa, 10 September 2017.
229 See News24, Police make massive R500m cocaine bust in
Overberg town, 22 June 2017, http://www.news24.com/
SouthAfrica/News/police-make-massive-r500m-cocainebust-in-overberg-town-20170622.
230 The interviews referred to here were with well-informed
people associated with the Cape gangs, heroin
rehabilitation workers, and law-enforcement personnel in
South Africa between September and November 2017.
231 In 2009, 150 kg of heroin was intercepted in a shipment
of tourist souvenirs at Heathrow Airport on a flight from
South Africa. The trail was traced back to Durban and then
Mozambique, where the South African organised-crime
unit, the Hawks, said the heroin had been packed with
the curios. See South African Hawks in drugs bust, BBC,
16 September 2016, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/
africa/8259456.stm.
232 Interview, Western Cape police detective, Cape Town,
South Africa, 8 October 2017.
233 Interview, law-enforcement officials, Cape Town, South
Africa, 26 October 2017.
234 Interview, individuals close to the Cape gang milieu,
Cape Town, South Africa, November 2017.
235 Interviews with various members of several community
policing forums on the Cape Flats in gang-controlled areas
in Cape Town, 25–26 October 2017; interview, community
leaders and gang members, Cape Town, South Africa,
27 October 2017.
236 Interview, former senior police officer involved in
organised-crime investigations, Cape Town, South Africa,
9 September 2017.
237 Ibid.
238 Interview, senior police officer, Cape Town, South Africa,
8 September 2017.
239 J Pauw, The President’s Keepers, Cape Town: Tafelberg,
2017.
240 For a whistle-blower’s account, see J van Loggerenberg,
Rogue: The Inside Story of SARS’s Elite Crime-busting Unit,
Cape Town: Jonathan Ball Publishers, 2016.
241 C Dolley and A Serrao, Underworld, tobacco and drug
war sparks shootings and protests, News 24, 12 May
52 The heroin coast / A political economy along the eastern African seaboard
2017, https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/
underworld-tobacco-and-drug-war-sparks-shootings-andprotests-20170512.
242 Ibid.
243 C Dolley, Gang, guns and rogue crime intelligence
claims ruffle underworld, News 24, 9 September
2017, https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/
gang-guns-and-rogue-crime-intelligence-claims-ruffleunderworld-20170919.
244 Cape gangster gets VIP invite to Zuma’s party, News24,
27 April 2014, http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/
Politics/Cape-gangster-gets-VIP-invite-to-Zumasparty-20140427.
245 C Dolley, Underworld unmasked, News24, 11 August
2017, http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/news24-
showcase-unmasking-cape-towns-underworld-20170811.
246 Assassinations have spread beyond locations that they
were traditionally associated with, namely KwaZulu-Natal,
the Western Cape and, to some extent, Gauteng. This
data is from the Assassinations Witness Project run in
collaboration with the University of Cape Town. A more
detailed analysis can be found in a forthcoming edition of
African Affairs.
247 Although workers claim they are always paid their salaries,
they know that the revenues of these hotels are too low
to support the hotels’ operating costs (such as labour
costs, toiletries and cleaning products, cleaning services,
taxes, electricity, telephone and other services). The
workers explain this discrepancy by saying that the owners
of the hotels have ‘other businesses’ that support the
hotels’ costs. Interviews with various hotel staff, Nampula,
6 October 2017.
248 Interview, prominent anti-corruption activist, Nairobi,
Kenya, 27 September 2017.
249 Interview, editor of Dar es Salaam property and real-estate
trade newspaper, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, 22 September
2017.
250 F Varese, Mafia Life: Love, Death and Money at the Heart
of Organised Crime, London: Profile Books, 2017.
251 C Olver, How to steal a city: The Battle for Nelson Mandela
Bay – An insider account, Cape Town: Jonathan Ball
publishers, 2017, 233.
252 Interview, investigative journalist, Maputo, Mozambique,
12 October 2017.
253 See, for example, the money that FRELIMO has raised
from the illegal timber trade. L Mabunda, Partido Frelimo
financia-se com dinheiro de contrabando de madeira
na Zambézia, Centro de Integridade Pública, November
2014, https://cipmoz.org/images/Documentos/AntiCorrupcao/329_CIP-a_transparencia_11.pdf.
254 Interview, investigative journalist, Maputo, Mozambique,
12 October 2017.
255 G Wannenburg, War, the state and criminal networks in
West and southern Africa: Africa’s pablos and political
entrepreneurs. Johannesburg: South African Institute of
International Affairs, 2006.
256 See D Paget, Dancers, branches, stereos and choppers:
Party finance and capital-intensive campaigning in
Tanzania, paper presented at the 60th Annual Meeting of
the African Studies Association, Chicago, November 2017.
257 T Madonsela, State of capture, Office of the Public
Protector, government of South Africa, 2014.
258 A number of books have documented this process. See,
for example, the following whistle-blower accounts: J van
Loggerenberg, Rogue: The Inside Story of SARS’s Elite
Crime-busting Unit, Cape Town: Jonathan Ball Publishers,
2016; J Pitchford, Blood on their hands: General Johan
Booysen reveals his truth, Cape Town: Pan Macmillan;
C Olver, How to steal a city: The Battle for Nelson Mandela
Bay – An insider account, Cape Town: Jonathan Ball
publishers, 2017.
259 Though as a part of the criminal-justice system, these are
also compromised.
260 This is not to say the criminal-justice system is not
compromised – indeed, the police are seen to be perhaps
the most corrupt (and powerful) institution in the country.
261 Informal report provided to the GI by an analyst working
for an intergovernmental organisation, October 2017.
262 Interview, judge, Maputo, Mozambique, 10 September
2017.
263 Interview, retired bank employee, Maputo, Mozambique,
12 September 2017.
264 Informal report provided to the GI by an analyst working
for an intergovernmental organisation, October 2017.
265 S Beckerleg, M Telfer and GL Hundt, The rise of injecting
drug use in East Africa: A case study from Kenya, Harm
Reduction Journal, 2:12, 2005.
266 GP Kilonzo et al, Rapid situational assessment for drug
demand reduction in Tanzania, UN Development
Programme, 2001.
267 E Muhondwa, R Mpembeni and F Mayunga, An
assessment of the treatment needs of drug users in Dar es
Salaam, report by Christ Compassion in Action prepared
for Save the Children UK, Tanzania Programme, 2002.
268 Most recent data from UNAIDS.
269 Where high, low and medium estimates exist, then the
medium estimate is provided.
270 UNODC/ICHIRA, Rapid situational assessment of HIV
prevalence and risky behaviours among injecting drug
users in Kenya, 2011.
271 Information provided for annual report questionnaire
reporting.
272 UNODC/ICHIRA, Rapid situational assessment of HIV
prevalence and risky behaviours among injecting drug
users in Kenya, 2011.
273 National AIDS Control Programme, Consensus estimates
on key population size and HIV prevalence in Tanzania,
July 2014. Based on the following studies: Médecins du
Monde. Assessment of risk practices and infectious disease
Research Paper 04 / June 2018 53
among drug users in Temeke District, Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania, 2011; Williams et al, HIV seroprevalence in a
sample of Tanzanian intravenous drug users, AIDS Educ
Prev, 21:5, 2009, 474–483; Timpson et al, Substance abuse,
HIV risk, and HIV/AIDS in Tanzania, African Journal of Drug
and Alcohol Studies, 2006; Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention Tanzania, Mapping of people who use
drugs and people who inject drugs in Tanzania, 2014
(unpublished); Dahoma et al, HIV and substance abuse:
The dual epidemics challenging Zanzibar, African Journal
of Drug and Alcohol Studies, 2006.
274 National AIDS Control Programme, Consensus estimates
on key population size and HIV prevalence in Tanzania,
July 2014.
275 Figure provided by Tanzanian Health Authority, taken
from a study that is forthcoming. Rates of both HIV and
hepatitis C are higher among female users in Tanzania.
276 Isabel Sathane et al, Estimating the number of people
who inject drugs in two urban areas in Mozambique using
four different methods, J Int AIDS Soc., 2015; 18(5Suppl 4):
20479.
277 Ibid.
278 Ibid.
279 G Setswe et al, Programmatic mapping and size
estimation of key populations: Sex workers (male and
female), men who have sex with men, persons who inject
drugs and transgender people, Cape Town: Networking
HIV and AIDS Community of Southern Africa, 2015.
280 A Scheibe, B Brown and M dos Santos, Rapid assessment
of HIV prevalence and risk factors among people who
inject drugs from five South African cities, 2014.
281 Interim results of unpublished study provided to the
authors.
282 In South Africa there are privately funded NSP and OST
programmes, and projects funded by international
donors. There is one OST project serving some 300 people
who use heroin in Pretoria, which is funded by the local
government. The national government does not fund any
NSP or OST projects, and methadone and buprenorphine
are not available on the essential drug list for maintenance
therapies.
283 Comment made by a public-health expert at an expert
group meeting, 13–14 November 2017, Nairobi, Kenya.
284 Larney et al, Global, regional, and country-level coverage of
interventions to prevent and manage HIV and hepatitis C
among people who inject drugs: A systematic review, The
Lancet, 5, 2017, e1208–20.
285 Figure provided by Tanzanian Health Authority, taken from
a study which is forthcoming. Rates of both HIV and HVC
are higher among female users in Tanzania.
286 The International HIV/AIDS Alliance, Achievements and
challenges in introducing a harm reduction programme in
Kenya, 2016.
287 Ibid.
288 These are the traditional residential ‘rehab’ centres, which
reported to the government body SACENDU (The South
African Community Epidemiology Network on Drug
Use). In 2012 (before the large surge in use), 23% of the
admissions to these centres were for heroin addiction.
Government of South Africa, The National Drug Master
Plan, 2012–2016, Department of Social Development,
2012.
289 A Scheibe, et al, Safe treatment and treatment of safety:
Call for a harm-reduction approach to drug-use disorders
in South Africa, South African Harm Reduction Journal,
20th anniversary edition, 2017.
290 Among these gangs are Wakali Kwanza (‘dangerous first’)
in Mombasa’s Kisauni area, Wakali Wao (‘most dangerous’),
Wakali Kweli (‘dangerous indeed’) and Wakali Che
(‘dangerous till dawn’). Others, according to an academic
who studies the drug trade, are Wajukuu wa Bibi (‘wife’s
descendants’), Funga File (‘kill and close the file’), Taliban
and Kapenguria Six.
291 Interview, academic expert and practitioner in drug
rehabilitation, Mombasa, Kenya, 25 September 2017.
292 M Schuberth, The impact of drug trafficking on informal
security actors in Kenya, Africa Spectrum, 49:3, 2014,
55–81.
293 This phenomenon was noted by respondents with direct
experience of such attacks at our expert group meeting in
Nairobi on 13 November 2017.
294 M Schuberth, The impact of drug trafficking on informal
security actors in Kenya, Africa Spectrum, 49:3, 2014,
55–81.
295 This data is from the Institute of Safety Governance and
Criminology at the University of Cape Town. It draws
on South African Police Service data but, because
city boundaries don’t match police ones, it has to be
recalculated.
296 Available at http://globalinitiative.net/wp-content/
uploads/2016/04/Global-Initiative-Assessmentand-Programmign-Tool-for-Organized-Crime-andDevelopment-April-2016.pdf.
About the authors
Mark Shaw is the director of the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime (GI TOC)
and a senior visiting fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science’s International
Drug Policy Project. He was until recently the National Research Foundation Professor of Justice and
Security at the University of Cape Town’s Centre of Criminology, where he is now an adjunct professor.
Simone Haysom is a Senior Analyst at GI TOC and a visiting academic at the Department of
African Studies at the University of Oxford. She has previously worked as researcher at the Overseas
Development Institute in London, and spent several years working as a consultant on issues to do with
forced displacement, urban development, organised crime and policing.
Peter Gastrow is a senior adviser at GI TOC. He lives in Cape Town and has practiced as an advocate
of the Supreme Court, served as a parliamentarian, and as adviser to the South African minister of
police. Organised crime has been his main research focus since he served as Cape Town director of
the Institute for Security Studies and as a senior fellow at the International Peace Institute in New York.
About ENACT
ENACT builds knowledge and skills to enhance Africa’s response to transnational organised crime.
ENACT analyses how organised crime affects stability, governance, the rule of law and development
in Africa, and works to mitigate its impact.
ENACT is implemented by the Institute for Security Studies and INTERPOL, in affiliation with the
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime.
Acknowledgements
ENACT is funded by the European Union (EU). This publication has been produced with the assistance
of the EU.
Cover image: © rohane – Adobe Stock
The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of the author and can in no way be taken to reflect the
views or position of the European Union, or the ENACT partnership. Authors contribute to ENACT publications in
their personal capacity. © 2018, ENACT. Copyright in the volume as a whole is vested in ENACT, its partners, the EU
and the author, and no part may be reproduced in whole or in part without the express permission, in writing, of
the author and the ENACT partnership.
This project is funded
by the European Union
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