Angolan and Nigerian drug lords are recruiting poverty-trapped young Namibian women as drug mules and in some cases are even tipping off authorities about them so that drug carriers with larger shipments can slip through unnoticed.
These young women - despite being warned - still continue to fall prey to drug syndicates because they are offered large amounts of money to transit drugs.
A police spokesperson yesterday said that despite being warned in November last year by the Inspector General of the Namibian Police to refrain from such activities, another young woman had in the meantime been arrested in Dubai last year December after authorities were tipped off. The 28-year-old Windhoek woman was arrested with an unknown amount of heroin. If convicted she could face a 20-year jail sentence or even the death penalty. The most recent arrests of Namibian women as drug mules also iclude five women in Brazil and one in South Africa.
In Walvis Bay and Swakopmund, Nampol and neighborhood watches have been fighting local drug lords for the past five years and are also looking into their links with foreign syndicates.
Yesterday a police spokesperson told the Namib Times that they wished to reissue their warning to young Namibian women – including those at the Coast – to be careful not to be recruited by foreign nationals who befriend and date them and then offer them large amounts of money to bring drugs like cocaine from South American countries. With drug abuse spiraling at the Coast and the presence of foreign nationals that may be linked to the drug trade, fears are that it is only a matter of time before Coastal young women are targeted to become drug mules.
Police have confirmed that even pregnant young women are being used in this way and their poverty is being used against them to recruit them to make so called “easy money” by carrying drugs into Namibia. This is often done without the young women thinking of the consequences of being caught in foreign countries with drugs.
The police believe that untold amounts of Namibian girls are being used as drug mule decoys for foreign drug syndicates operating in the country.
Namibian women are apparently promised large amounts of money. However, they are used as decoys because they get arrested with small amounts of cocaine while a larger amount is able to get through, seeing as it is being widely used in Namibia. We do not know how it gets through to Namibia, but large amounts of cocaine are able to pass through, a police spokesman confirmed to the Namib Times.
Young girls fall prey to drug lords, because they are vulnerable and are promised many rewards, including money and status symbols when they return from a drug carrying trip.