adminA LOT of noise has been made on the need to seal our borders and curb the continued smuggling of goods into the country, which is costing the nation millions of dollars in possible tax revenue.
However, events on the ground present a different picture to the anti-smuggling gospel that is preached daily.
Illegal imports are being smuggled into the country right under the nose of security details and Zimra officials manning the exit points.
Rot is rampant and Mutare’s Forbes Border Post is no exception.
Last Thursday’s arrest of a Malawian truck driver who was transporting 889kgs of mbanje into the country en-route to South Africa from Malawi is just a tip of an ice-berg.
Those privy to the case revealed that the driver was just unlucky probably due to a communication breakdown with syndicates that get paid to do the pioneering work to ensure the easy passage of the truck into the country.
They said drugs and an assortment of illegal substances were crossing through the border post disguised as groceries, pet food, soya means and so forth.
The driver was arrested after detectives received a tip off that there was a haulage truck coming from Malawi en-route to South Africa on April 28 carrying mbanje.
To dupe customs officials, the driver had papers which showed that he had 1 200 bags of wheat. Because of the tip off, Zimra officials were told to thoroughly search the truck, resulting in it being taken to warehouse where contraband was exposed.
We are told that several such trucks are finding easy passage at the border post because of rampant corruption among customs officials, clearing agents and detectives who man the border.
They make a fortune and some of them show off with expensive lifestyles they lead yet they are mere civil servants.
Besides the drugs, we hear that the State is also losing out to fuel dealers who dupe customs officials into believing that they are transporting fuel from Mozambique to other neighbouring countries like Zambia through Zimbabwe.
To them this is fuel in transit. It does not pay duty at the Forbes Border post in Mutare and is supposed to only do so when it reaches the country’s border with Zambia in Chirundu.
This fuel never goes to Zambia and is fraudulently offloaded at some service stations in the country and sold to the public.
These people make a killing because they do not pay anything to Government.
Everything goes into their pockets and those of customs officials involved in this rot.
The smuggling of second hand clothes cannot go unmentioned.
What is surprising is that despite the army and the police deploying hundreds of details of seal off the borders, the smuggling of second hand clothes continues.
It does not need a rocket scientist to know that those who are supposed to protect the borders are the ones putting their hands into the cooking jar.
They are the very people who, in the dead of the night, are orchestrating the easy passage of contraband into the country, providing security to smugglers and valuable intelligence information to evade being arrested.
The anti-corruption chorus has been sang and heard and this is the time to play the music.
For as long as our State institutions manning the border fail to nail those involved in these illicit deals, the war against smugglers will never be won. We need to police the police, guard the guards and detect the movements of our own detectives because everyone is a suspect.
Online Reporter