Elephants tusks smuggling: DCI springs into action (Tanzania)

SAYUNI KIMARO, This Day

May 20, 2009

POLICE in the country are investigating a suspected international smuggling ring involving the rampant illegal export of elephant tusks from Tanzania, the Director of Criminal Investigations (DCI), Robert Manumba, has said. 

The investigation follows a recent spate of media reports on huge shipments of prime jumbo tusks originating from Tanzania being seized by customs officials on arrival in various foreign lands. 

The shipments are now suspected to be part of a multi-million-dollar ivory smuggling network also behind the increasingly wanton slaughter of hundreds of elephants in the country’s national parks. 

Commissioner of Police Manumba told THISDAY in an interview in Dar es Salaam yesterday that the police was now officially following up the reports of a rise in ivory smuggling out of the country. 

’’Actually, I had no idea about the smuggling operation...we have learned about it this morning (yesterday) from the news. We will be making a follow-up and contacting our counterparts in those countries where the seizures have been reported to have taken place,’’ the DCI stated. 

He was responding to a front-page report in the THISDAY edition of Tuesday this week, on a shipment of jumbo tusks worth more than $1m (approx. 1.4bn/-) being seized by customs officials in Manila, the Philippines. 

The trophies were reported to have been hidden inside a container full of purported blow moulding machines, which arrived from Tanzania last March. 

According to Philippines customs officials quoted by the local media in that country, the container was subjected to a formal customs inspection on the basis of a tip-off that its contents had been falsely declared. 

’’When we opened the container, the tip turned out to be true. The shipment actually contained elephant tusks,’’ Philippines customs police chief Joey Yuchongco was quoted as saying. 

He said the registered importer of the shipment, identified as 210 Enterprises, had abandoned the container at the Manila port’s south harbour since March 1 this year. 

Elephant tusks are known to be the primary source of ivory, a white material used in making religious statues, piano keys, and other expensive products. 

It was also reported in March this year that authorities in Vietnam  not far from Philippines  had announced the confiscation of a much larger shipment of jumbo tusks similarly smuggled from Tanzania. 

The consignment seized in Vietnam was reported to be worth a whopping $29.41m (approx.40bn/-).