A man arrested in one of KZN's biggest drug busts says he came to SA after an Islamic group forced him to flee Nigeria.
|||Durban - A 38-year-old man accused of dealing in drugs with an estimated street value of more than R34 million said he came to South Africa after an Islamic group forced him to flee his home country of Nigeria.
About two weeks ago, at his plush residence in the gated Panorama Park estate at Illovo Beach, Collins Orji Uwakaneme and his wife, Veliswa, were arrested in what has been described as one of province’s biggest drug busts.
Police seized more than 16 000 ecstasy tablets and about 50kg of heroin, with a street value of more than R34m.
In his bail application in the Durban Regional Court on Thursday Uwakaneme said he fled Nigeria because he was on the run from an Islamic group after he defamed a religious book.
“I was chased out by an Islamic group who said it wasn’t proper for someone to clean their behinds with a religious book.”
He and his wife of six years face two counts of dealing in drugs after police found the narcotics, in what appeared to be a drug laboratory at the R8 000-a-month house they rented in Illovo.
In his evidence, he said it was not drugs that were found at his residence, but bath salts.
The court heard that the drugs had been sent for analysis.
Uwakaneme said they were moving out of the house, when they were arrested.
The court heard that Uwakaneme, who claims he made a living as a hawker, earning R12 000 a month, had, since arriving in the country in December 2004, moved seven times before moving to Illovo where he was arrested.
He said he travelled from Nigeria via Cameroon and made his way to Swaziland before crossing the border into South Africa. His journey took three weeks, he said.
Uwakaneme lived in Mahatma Gandhi (Point) Road for a few months, when he first arrived, and then moved to Berea and also rented a few places in Morningside.
He said he had lived in the country for nine years and had received an asylum seeker’s permit from the Department on Home Affairs in 2005.
During cross-examination by prosecutor Ayesha Bissessur, Uwakaneme, who does not possess a South African visa, said he had travelled abroad, using his Nigerian passport, between 2004 and 2011. In March 2008, he spent one month in Nigeria visiting his family.
Between 2010 and 2011, he visited his family in Nigeria, again.
When asked by Bissessur, why he returned after fleeing the Islamic group, Uwakaneme said: “I believed that the people who were after me were no longer looking for me.”
Uwakaneme said he also visited China in 2011 on a business trip to negotiate the sale of a toilet paper machine.
He said he was also a shareholder in a business called Chebez International, based in Morningside, which imported caps and other headgear.
The bail application is to continue later this month.
rizwana.umar@inl.co.za
Daily News
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