Dibete police crack down on cross-border car smuggling

Police in Dibete are battling cross-border car smuggling with law enforcement officers making weekly arrests at the barrier gate, north of the country where motor vehicle thieves target the Toyota Hilux GD6.

South African (SA) nationals have made up the weekly toll arrests of suspects in cases of stolen vehicles from the southerly neighbour. The suspects have been using Botswana as a transit to smuggle stolen vehicles to Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Already, Dibete police have intercepted nine stolen vehicles with the most stolen being the Toyota models, particularly the Toyota Hilux GD6 and Toyota Fortuner. Weekly interception of SA auto thieves driving from the south to north of the country has been occurring.

In a rather shocking experience, two weeks ago Dibete police nabbed two SA women who were suspected to be the brains of the operation. The cops discovered from the women’s passports that they had been crossing the border into Botswana every week, driving into the country, and returning by flight to SA from the DRC.

At the time of arrest, the duo had entered the country via the Sikwane border post and drove to the north of the country. Dibete Police Station commander, Superintendent Meshack Ranku said they suspect that the two women might have been smuggling vehicles for a while without being detected looking at the information from their passports. From observation, the police said the duo’s travel patterns give a telling picture.

“We suspect that there is a market for these stolen vehicles in DRC and Mozambique (because) it is where they have to cross to. “A few days ago, we arrested yet another SA man of Thabo Sehune, Pretoria with a suspected stolen Ford Everest,” he said. Ranku added that the Pretoria resident was intercepted by the police at the barrier gate around 4am. “All of the people we have intercepted were heading north of the country hence strongly suspecting they might have established a market either in Zambia, Mozambique or DRC and using Botswana as a transit to smuggle these vehicles,” he said.

“We suspect that this theft might have been a problem for a while before we started keeping a close eye on these vehicles this year,” Ranku added. Besides the GD6, the station commander said other targeted vehicles are Toyota

Fortuner adding “we have recently discovered that smugglers have added Toyota Cross and Ford Ranger vehicles”. He further revealed that the smugglers travel at night and early in the morning hence the need to intensify their search. “Usually, when interrogated by the police at the roadblock the smugglers would fail to account and produce proper documents for the vehicles, and when we contact our South African police counterparts the cars would have been reported missing,” Ranku said.

Asked how the smugglers get hold of the vehicles, he explained that some would have been hijacked from their owners whilst others are stolen at parking lots either at the malls or in homes.

For his part, Kazungula Police Station commander, Superintendent Phetogo Phillimon said they have intercepted three suspected stolen vehicles from SA at Ngwasha gate heading towards Kasane.

He said even though the numbers are low in their jurisdiction, cross-border car smuggling worries them. Phillimon added that this is especially since they do not know how many cars managed to pass through the borders without detection.

He further revealed that the smugglers travel at night and early in the morning hence the need to intensify their search