Crime wave hits SA harbours

Over two million containers enter South Africa's harbours every year and many of them contain tons of counterfeit goods or millions of rands worth of drugs.

There is increasing pressure on police and other agencies to crack down on the flood of counterfeit goods and drugs pouring into the country in steel containers through nearly every harbour.

But experts and authorities warn the import and export opportunities presented by the 2010 World Cup will hamper the battle to stem this criminal tsunami.

Policing South Africa's harbours for contraband is a "cat and mouse game, where the odds are stacked heavily in favour of the mouse", said one expert who has researched illegal activities in the ports.

Police say mandrax is the most popular drug coming through and is imported from China, followed by cocaine from South America.

This week police in Cape Town seized 10kg of cocaine with an estimated street value of between R5-million and R6-million from a Russian vessel docked in Table Bay.

National narcotics head for organised crime Senior Superintendent Deven Naicker said there were just too many containers entering the harbours and it was difficult to have every container checked. About 2,5-million containers entered the country's harbours ever year.

"We have thousands of staff members and security, but there are just so many containers. We've had a lot of successes, but we need container scanners at every harbour." Durban is the only harbour with a container scanner, which works like a giant X-ray machine.

Peter Gastrow of the Organised Crime and Corruption Programme at the Institute for Security Studies has looked into triad societies and Chinese organised crime in South Africa. In a research paper he said Chinese criminal groups had become well-organised entities, modelled on China's triad societies.

They were active in South African cities and had branched out into a range of criminal activities such as various forms of fraud, drug-trafficking, firearm-smuggling, extortion, money-laundering, prostitution, illegal gambling, the smuggling of illegal immigrants, tax evasion and the large-scale importing of counterfeit goods.

The illicit harvesting and exporting of abalone no longer constitutes the core activity of these groups.

Gauteng had become the hub of their activities.

But they were also active in all South Africa's harbour cities and had even been observed in small seaside resorts such as Port Alfred in the Eastern Cape.

In an interview this week, Gastrow warned that "the triad operations are bigger, better and have expanded into a more sophisticated international phenomenon".

"Not enough is done to secure our harbours. There are limited resources and we don't have the finances for hi-tech security that is needed.

"It is crucial that intelligence work be done with overseas police and officials. Collaboration will make it easier to track contraband goods."

He said many of the triad members had followed a long and patient route to establish themselves here. When they arrived, they invested in a legitimate business, which was then used as a front.

He said the growth in the illicit importing of counterfeit goods was also facilitated through companies. Although it was not possible to confirm that Chinese organised criminal groups dominated this market, it had become a substantial trade that involved counterfeit goods and a marked increase in drug-trafficking.

"Corruption plays an important role in facilitating the activities of all organised criminal groups. The Department of Customs and Excise has been targeted for the purpose of clearing illicitly imported counterfeit goods, often with forged documents."

Researcher and writer Jonny Steinberg has done a number of reports on drug smuggling in Durban harbour, the country's main port, which sees more than one million containers enter its waters each year.

He said along with abalone, cannabis was South Africa's largest contraband export. The growth of cannabis exports had been spectacular. Illicit traders were able to accrue a double benefit from trading in weak currency zones, benefiting from weak currencies when exporting, and skirting them when importing.

"Volumes of counterfeit goods … enter the harbour every day, stealing market share from legitimate local manufacturers."

Steinberg said the relationship between border control agencies and drug smugglers was a simple cat-and-mouse game with the odds stacked heavily in favour of the mouse.

The smuggler's task was far easier than the border control agent's task, which was why there was an international contraband industry worth trillions of rands.