Cocaine worth R80m found stuffed in frozen chickens

Police have intercepted a smuggling scam involving cocaine stuffed in chickens imported by a local frozen food importer.

After a tip-off, police found cocaine worth R80m hidden inside the poultry after tracking down the shipment from Brazil to the Dube Tradeport in eThekwini on Saturday.

The importer, Fred Hume — who is based in Gqeberha and is often used as a commentator advocating for increased poultry imports to bring down local prices — has denied any knowledge of how the drugs made their way into the chickens. 

Hume explained how criminals intercept containers and add drugs, something the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime has said is common. 

Hume said “sadly, this type of shipment ‘hijacking’ is not unheard of among SA importers, as criminal activities at our country’s ports are a reality.

“A similar incident happened to a paint importer from Brazil earlier this week, and over the years various shipments of poultry from Brazil have been found to be carrying cocaine.”

KwaZulu-Natal police received a tip-off that drugs would be found in the container, which they tried to access at the Durban harbour but it had been moved to a wholesaler. The police eventually tracked down the container to a private storage facility at the Dube TradePort.

Police found 228kg of rock or crack cocaine in the chicken that had arrived from Brazil. Provincial commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi was at the bust. 

According to the police statement, SA Revenue Service documents said the shipment was destined for Hume’s head office in Gqeberha, something he denies. He said it was going from the Durban port to a client in another province.

The Daily Maverick earlier in 2023 reported on a bust in Brazil, in which 276kg of cocaine was found hidden in frozen chicken destined for SA. 

Hume said he brings in about 6,000 containers a year and occasionally containers on trucks are hijacked and then found with little missing, suggesting they may have had illegitimate cargo added. 

The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime, an NGO based in Geneva, has said drugs from South America frequently make their way through containers to SA. 

A senior expert at the NGO, Jason Eligh, told Business Day “containers are extremely important for global trade and cocaine”. 

He said: “Because there are so many containers and so many ships, most ports are only able to scan around 2% of the containers”.

This leaves 98% of containers that move unhindered through ports and most contain legal goods. 

Eligh said: “A common technique for traffickers is to contaminate a container. After the container has been sealed, somebody cuts the seal, places drugs into the container and reseals it with a fraudulent seal.”

When that container reaches its destination port, drugs are removed before anyone opens the container to access the legitimate goods. He said this means it’s not necessarily the person or business who receives the container who is smuggling the cocaine.

But he said it is “equally plausible” the importer is aware of the drugs hidden within the goods. This is especially so if the drugs are added to the goods rather than just found within the container. 

Hume said his firm, Hume International, has been a part of the food import industry for over 25 years and this is the first time it has encountered something of this nature. He said he has not been contacted by the police but will be fully co-operative and will provide information to support their investigations.

childk@businesslive.co.za