EDITORIAL - Going global

Filipinos are caught trying to smuggle heroin into China, while in the Philippines, authorities are apprehending drug mules who arrive in Manila all the way from Africa. The illegal drug trade, one of the most lucrative activities in the world, is fully globalized, and posing greater challenges to law enforcement authorities.

Within less than a month, NAIA authorities have apprehended five Africans with kilos of shabu in their luggage. On Feb. 27, Lina Aching Noah of Kenya was caught with 9.3 kilos of shabu or methamphe-tamine hydrochloride. On March 3, Josephine Balikuddembe of Uganda was nabbed with 4.5 kilos of shabu. On March 11, a woman from Guinea who flew in from Abu Dhabi was held at the NAIA. Six months pregnant, Aisha Camara started bleeding the next day and needed hospitalization. When her luggage was inspected, it yielded 2.7 kilos of shabu concealed in the bottom. On March 13, Kenyan couple Joseph Kyeremateng and Solemana Ham-shaww were also caught with shabu in their luggage.

What did the Africans intend to do with the drugs in the Philippines? Authorities hope to find out with the arrest in Mandaluyong last Wednesday of a resident of Zamboanga City. Nabral Abdulah Mansul is suspected of being the Filipino contact of the Africans.

For the Philippines, the drug problem is compounded by the employment of nearly 10 million Filipinos all over the world, many of them vulnerable to the lure of making a fast buck for working on the side as drug mules. Within the Philippines, corrupt personnel at ports of entry make the country a popular transshipment point for illegal drugs and other types of contraband. Despite repeated raids, shabu laboratories continue to proliferate in the country, with the operators widely believed to be protected by anti-narcotics agents themselves. Raids on shabu laboratories rarely lead to the arrest of the principal operators and financiers.

The suspected couriers from Africa at least were apprehended. Authorities should coordinate with their counterparts in other countries to bust the crime rings that employed the mules. Those crime rings could also be employing Filipinos, and sending them to their deaths in countries where drug trafficking is a capital offense.