Criminals mustn’t spoil strong ties between neighbours

WHEN neighbouring states are good friends, a lot of problems simply no longer happen, let alone need solving, and generally speaking, the highly positive environment allows faster economic growth, smoother trade and a lot of other advantages.

But there is a downside. Criminals find it easier to operate across the borders, and stolen goods and smuggled goods are far easier to sneak across a friendly frontier. Even wanted criminals like to just step across the border and seek sanctuary in the neighbouring country.

So along with letting the honest do more business, improving trade links and taking advantage of lower transport costs, our law enforcement has to be stepped up, or at least made more efficient and operate with ever greater co-ordination with our neighbours.

This has been highlighted with the process leading up to today’s summit between President Mnangagwa and President Mokgweetsi Masisi of Botswana as part of the fourth session of the Botswana-Zimbabwe Bi-National Commission, which has already gone through the stages of officials and Foreign Ministers.

There are so many positives, and so much good has been done with the improving relations and the greater input from the business sectors in the two countries, that the work of criminals cannot be allowed to deter even better relations.

The long border, marked by the Shashi River which is hardly a major African river and very easy to walk across, has allowed rustlers to cross the border and raid herds on the other side.

This was brought up in the previous third session of the commission, and steps have been taken on both sides of the border for more police and other resources to be allocated to fight this crime, and for greater cooperation between the police and other authorities in the two countries.

But while there has been significant reduction in rustling, the crime has not been eliminated and is still seen as a serious problem. Obviously we need to do a lot more, and fortunately more can be done.

There could well be need for more cooperation between police forces, and not just from central headquarters to central headquarters.

This police cooperation needs to move right down to station level, so that rustlers are pursued on the other side of the border as quickly as possible.

Most stolen cattle is slaughtered quickly, getting rid of the evidence while making sure of the profits of crime and it is easier to secure court convictions if the criminals can be caught with the live cattle.

Co-ordinated operations on each side of the border, with the patrols on each side in radio contact and assisted by drones, can help to ensure that crossing a border is not gaining refuge but rather simply switching one set of pursuers for a new group of trappers.

When crime does not pay then criminals scale back, and even cease, their operations.

The other three borders tend to have smuggling as the main crime. The Limpopo is well-marked as the southern border but unless the river has risen in flood from very recent rains, there are most days and weeks of the year well-known crossing points, and it is even possible for vehicles to be rafted across.

Consumer goods tend to be smuggled north and cigarettes south, as smugglers take advantage of the different customs and excise duties on each side of the river, and dangerous and illegal drugs can go in bother directions.

It is fairly obvious from recent reports when bribes have been offered that there was corruption on both sides, creating more space for the criminals, although this is seen as a serious menace and evermore successful efforts to defeat corruption have been working.

Added to the better patrolling and the start of the use of drones to monitor crossing points, the smugglers are coming under ever greater pressure.

Unlike the rustling on the Botswana border, where crimes are committed on both sides, smuggling has the additional complication that the crime is usually committed on just one side, or at the actual crossing point.

For example, anyone can drive a truck full of cigarettes around Beitbridge district in Zimbabwe so long as they have bought the cigarettes legally and paid the modest Zimbabwean duties. The Zimbabwean authorities cannot stop this.

In the same way someone can drive a truck of consumer goods around Limpopo province, without the South African police able to do very much to stop them.

The offence takes place when the goods are sneaked across the border without paying the customs or excise duties, and then driven untaxed around the other country.

But even when the goods are still legal on one side, there must be many occasions when there is a deep suspicion that the holders of the goods plan on smuggling, and surely this sort of information can be passed to the other side.

Police do act “on information received”, and exchanging intelligence does not abrogate any rights while it does allow criminals to be caught when they commit the crime.

The same sort of smuggling problems exist along the Mozambican border, and to a lesser degree along the Zambian border. The same sort of intelligence swopping is needed.

Along with the legal goods being smuggled there are illegal goods, usually drugs, and here the offence is committed on both sides. The drug smugglers will use the same routes and crossing points as the tax-evading smugglers, so a general clamp down will solve a double problem.

Criminals do seek sanctuary over borders, so you get a robber on one side who is a model visitor on the other.

But usually that criminal has had to cross the border illegally which makes informal extradition very easy.

The criminal can simply be arrested for breaching immigration codes and deported, and here the police on each side of the border seem more than willing to tell the force on the other side the precise time and place of deportation, so they can be waiting with handcuffs ready.

There are formal extradition treaties coming into effect, and those can cope with the criminal who has established legal residency on both sides.

Cooperation is generally growing between the anti-crime authorities, as well as between the trade and transport authorities, so we can keep all the benefits of continually improving relations with our neighbours while being able to make sure criminal elements cannot take advantage of these.