Yumbe Police seize smuggled cigarettes

Mar 02, 2011

THE Police in Yumbe district on Sunday impounded a lorry carrying 170 bales of smuggled Supermatch cigarettes estimated to be worth over sh200m.

By Richard Drasimaku

THE Police in Yumbe district on Sunday impounded a lorry carrying 170 bales of smuggled Supermatch cigarettes estimated to be worth over sh200m.

Josephine Angucia, the West Nile regional Police spokesperson, said the goods were transported from South Sudan on an Isuzu truck which was escorted by a man riding on a Bajaj motorcycle without a registration number plate.

Angucia said the truck was impounded by a team of police officers led by the Yumbe district Police commander, Maxwell Ogwal, after a tip- off by suspicious residents.

The residents thought the vehicle was smuggling fire arms since they used a short cut to enter from Sudan into Moyo district.

The truck was intercepted near River Kochi bridge along Yumbe-Moyo road at 11:00pm.

The man on the motorcycle on sensing danger abandoned it and ran into a bush while Ogwal overtook the speeding truck and packed his vehicle in front of it to force it to stop.

Charles Edema, the truck driver, said he was hired by a person he didn’t know who was leading him on the motorcycle. Both the truck and the motorcycle were taken to Arua Police station.

An official of the Uganda Revenue Authority, who refused to be named, revealed that 83% of cigarette business in West Nile region was controlled by smugglers.

Angucia said the Edema was taken to Arua central Police station for further interrogation. She added that the owner of the cigarettes, if arrested, would be charged with carrying smuggled goods .



(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});