BRASILIA: At least 10 Namibian women are currently imprisoned in South Africa and Brazil for drug trafficking, police spokesperson Edwin Kanguatjivi has revealed.
Kanguatjivi said these statistics are not surprising considering that foreign syndicates often lure desperate women with promises of luxury and instant riches.
The records, Kanguatjivi said, do not show any Namibian men serving time in foreign prisons for drug trafficking. “The Namibian police strongly warn Namibian citizens to be cautious of foreign drug traffickers who recruit innocent vulnerable citizens, especially women, to become drug mules,” he said.
His warning comes after Indonesia executed two Australians, four Nigerians, a Brazilian and an Indonesian for drug smuggling. Seven others remain imprisoned.
Kanguatjivi said up until 2013, 11 Namibian women were incarcerated in foreign prisons on drug trafficking charges, saying that six are in Brazil, while four are in South Africa, while the eleventh woman, who served time in Brazil, was released last year.
The 38-year-old woman, who spoke to The Namibian last week on condition of anonymity, said she was released in April last year after serving five years in Butantã women’s prison in São Paulo for drug trafficking.
The mother of one said she was arrested in August 2009 after five kilograms of cocaine were discovered in her suitcase by law enforcement officers in that country.
She said she had travelled to the South American country after a Nigerian national, whom she only identified as “Delington” sent her to buy Brazilian hair extensions in São Paulo, only to be arrested at the Guarulhos International Airport while boarding a plane to return to Namibia.
“He (Delington) approached me and said he needed someone to travel to Brazil in order to buy hair and I volunteered. I had no idea that cocaine was buried in the waists of a pile of denim trousers that were in my luggage. The 42 denim trousers were placed in my luggage under the pretext that they were for Delington’s business,” she said.
The Windhoek resident told The Namibian of horror stories and bad living conditions inside the Brazilian prisons and how she almost lost her life and was bullied while witnessing cold blood murders inside the jails.
“I never thought I would come out of prison alive,” she said, trying to fight back her tears. The former drug trafficker said her experience taught her not to trust foreign nationals who approach her with “get rich quick schemes”.
“I was fortunate that I did not get arrested in any of the countries that have death penalties for drug trafficking or else I would not be alive today, but I learned it the hard way” she said.
The Namibian contacted the Namibian embassy in Brazil last week to enquire how the six women were coping in the prisons but a senior official there, Siluka Kabuku said they were not at liberty to talk.
“Contact the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” Kabuku said.
However, the permanent secretary at the ministry of foreign affairs Selma Ashipala-Musavyi was not available for comment.
Kanguatjivi believes that most of the Namibian women incarcerated in foreign prisons over drug trafficking were approached with similar tactics by men who promised them a life of luxury.
He said that during 2014, no Namibian was arrested in foreign territories for drug trafficking, which he says can be ascribed to an effective media campaign launched in 2012.
He said Namibia was one of the countries whose citizens were not on the hot list of Interpol’s drug traffickers last year. Kanguatjivi said that there are currently 36 foreigners in Namibian prisons detained for drug trafficking, the majority of who are from Nigeria, Tanzania, Burundi, Congo, Zambia and Angola.
“A Nigerian national was arrested four weeks ago trying to sell drugs to a police officer,” he said.
Kanguatjivi also said they recently arrested a Namibian who was growing weed in a backyard of a house. He also said police are on high alert for increasing foreign nationals who are operating illegally using Namibian identity documents.
He said last week, four Somalian nationals were arrested at the O R Tambo International Airport in South Africa with fake Namibian passports.
“It was not clear why they were carrying fake Namibian documents but we suspect they might be drug traffickers, although no drugs were found in their possession,” he said
