The Mozambican Criminal Investigation Police (PIC) have arrested four senior officers of the customs service in the western province of Tete in connection with the disappearance of seven 100 kilo bags of tablets of the illegal drug mandrax, reports Thursday's issue of the Maputo daily "Noticias".
The drug had been seized by customs on the road between the town of Moatize and the frontier post of Zobue, near the border with Malawi, late in May.
It was immediately stored in the customs warehouse in Tete city. while awaiting the results of laboratory analysis to confirm the nature of the tablets.
Health services technicians collected 100 tablets of the product on 26 May, at the request of customs. They sent them to a Maputo laboratory and, from there to a laboratory in South Africa. The results confirmed that the product was indeed mandrax.
The drug did not vanish overnight from the warehouse.
Investigators discovered that it disappeared bit by bit, and was replaced by other, relatively harmless, tablets - aspirin and paracetamol.
These pills were apparently not diverted from the health service. The Tete Provincial Health Directorate said it had never received significant quantities of aspirin or paracetamol for its health units, and so did not know where the pills had come from. The police are still investigating and believe that more people may be involved and more arrests may be made in connection with the case.
Fonte: AIM
