adminWhen Chronicle visited the border post between Monday and yesterday, conmen and bogus clearing agents could be seen milling around the customs yard touting for “clients.”
The criminals continue to find their way into the border area through the porous perimeter fence.
They target mostly first time visitors not familiar with immigration and customs procedures. They then approach them under the guise of offering to assist in completing the formalities for a fee.
The “services” range from completing customs declaration forms to “quickening the border clearance process” by jumping queues and in the process causing commotion at the customs and immigration halls.
This reporter on Tuesday observed a small group of American tourists being conned of their money by two touts who masqueraded as clearing agents and were carrying files.
The assistant regional immigration manager-in-charge of Beitbridge Border Post, Mr Charles Gwede, said of late the border post has been extremely busy resulting in criminals taking advantage of the situation.
“We are aware that criminals, especially touts and bogus clearing agents are taking advantage of long queues at the border to lure unsuspecting travellers into accepting their dubious services. The challenge that we are facing as immigration department is that we have an acute shortage of staff to clear queues during busy days as well as monitoring touts at the same time making it easy for these criminals to approach travellers and swindle them of their money,” he said.
Mr Gwede, however, warned travellers against accepting the services of touts and unregistered clearing agents.
Recently the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) also placed a public notice in the Press warning travellers about individuals who are masquerading as clearing agents and operating at the country’s border posts.
Investigations by Chronicle revealed that a conman would demand an average of R500 to assist a traveller complete a customs declaration form.
The fee, however, goes up to between R800 and R1 000 if a traveller is in possession of goods that require the payment of customs duty and the touts facilitate in smuggling the goods.
It is the responsibility of Zimra and immigration officials to assist travellers not familiar with the border processes and no fee is charged.
Mr James Mudavanhu, a registered local clearing agent said: “Bogus clearing agents are tarnishing our image. They continue to enter the customs yard and con unsuspecting travellers and what is mind-boggling is the fact that there are police officers and security personnel manning the border, but these criminals conduct their illicit activities right under their nose.”
Mr Gwede said that despite the border post having been declared a security area under the Protected Places Act, criminals continued to sneak into the yard through a damaged perimeter fence.
“The border post is a security zone and there has to be controlled access and we are saying only bona fide travellers and those with relevant business should be seen at the border. However, sadly criminals continue to access the area largely because of security laxity and the porous fence.
“We therefore urge all key stakeholders, especially the police to intensify patrols at the border post to address this problem of criminality,” he said.
Beitbridge, the busiest inland port of entry in sub-Saharan Africa, handles an average of 15 000 travellers everyday including a huge volume of commercial traffic passing through.
During the peak period the number of travellers rises to about 25 000.
Online Reporter