Bhang worth Sh100million being off loaded from a police van on Friday

Migori county police bosses have intensified the campaign to end bhang trafficking menace in the county and beyond due to the porous border with the neighboring country Tanzania.

According to former Nyatike police boss Richard Mukwate, bhang trade in Migori has to be curbed to avoid youths from being addicted in drug menace.

Security officers and leaders in the county are afraid that bhang traders have opted to plant bhang in the county apart from Tanzania where due to laxity of law and enforcement the crop is grown visibly in large scale.

In December last year police in Nyatike managed to get Sh50million bhang grown in seven acres farm at Wath Onger area.

A week later in January Sh1.6million bhang was nabbed as it was being transported on motorbike to a home in Sori town to be packed and sent to Nairobi.

During the two incidents six people were arrested and three motorbikes impounded.

The Migori town police station which is used as holding area for bhang exhibit to be used in court also holds Sh50million worth of the illegal drugs in vaults.

“We want to assure leaders and residents that we are up in arms to help reduce bhang trafficking in Nyatike and Migori county and put local police to task,” Governor Okoth said.

Obado said that Tanzania growers boosted by a thought that Kenya offers a ready market have been growing the crop in large scale and use Migori as a conduit area.

He said that even though the bhang trade is a multi-million shillings business farmers and middle men are always paid peanuts with big cats and barons getting a huge share of the cut.

“If we need to end drug trade we should first work closely with security officers who should tell us who are the drug barons using Migori county,” he said.

The county Government has pledged to increase border patrol to help the police curb the drug in the region and the Tanzania border by providing the police with more patrol vehicles.

Clement Gatogo, the county police commandant speaking to the press at the time the bhang haul seizure said all senior police officers from the county will intensify patrols.

“The bhang haul has to be destroyed to the limit to make the area more drug free to make the area more secure and also make the trade end in the region” he said.

The police boss has also said that the region has a lot of porous regions in the whole of the Tanzania that borders the county and the whole of south Nyanza region.

Traffickers are also using the Lake Victoria to transport the drug making it hard for the security officer to know who they as the confuse them of being fishermen in the lake.

Tanzanian Agnes Boke, 64, admitted that she plants the drug on the four acre land in the Mara region which he intercrops with beans and maize and said that Kenya’s region offer ready market for the drug and it has a lot of cash.

“Bhang has a lot of cash in the ready market of Kenya and I plant it on my four acre land as it fetches a lot for me and my family” she admitted to the press.

This comes a few days after the area police boss intensified the campaign in the region to flush out bhang traffickers.

“The bhang menace has enabled the youths not to participate in the development activities making the whole region being unproductive in the farming sector,” he said.

Migori County has had many cases of drug trafficking in the recent past with the bhang being transported to major towns in the country and the culprits being arraigned in court of law.

The trade intensifies in the county when the drug is harvested in the Mara region of Tanzania and then dried before it is transported using tinted vehicles to major towns of Nairobi, Mombasa, Eldoret and Nakuru.

“Immediately the drug is dried it is transported past the region in the towns of Mombasa, Nairobi and the North Rift region,” said one police officer.

During the end of last year drug business intensifies in the county as the police nab a lot of the drug in worth a lot of money.

The drugs are often packed into small bags or placed in coffins to evade police road blocks as their transported in tinted vehicles hired in Nairobi.