Yaba trafficking in Cox’s Bazar’s Teknaf is a piece of cake given that the dealers need zero investment to get into the business.
The drug consignments are delivered to specific people in Teknaf from the neighbouring Myanmar. If the police seize the drugs then no one has to pay for the damages or the drugs.
Only those who receive the consignment have to pay, that too in the country, eliminating all needs to send money to Myanmar. Agents at different locations across the country collect the money.
These “businessmen” from Dhaka, Teknaf and Chattogram pose as legitimate traders and siphon off the money to Dubai and Singapore.
According to the locals at Teknaf, the ringleaders of the yaba trade are still evading capture despite the surrender of over a hundred traffickers.
People familiar with the matter think that it will be difficult to win the war against unless the ringleaders are taken down.
On Saturday (Feb 16), 102 listed yaba traffickers surrendered to the home minister with 350,000 tablets of the contraband drug and 30 guns. However, locals say that a group of yaba and Hundi businessmen are still roaming free.
A Cox’s Bazar district police officer, wishing to remain anonymous, quoted a few traffickers saying, “Several powerful godfathers are behind yaba smuggling.”
He said that the members of that group are not even on the home ministry’s list and that dealers like the ones who surrendered are merely puppets while they are the ones controlling everything from behind the scenes.
He said that they provided the names of at least 30 agents during their confession.
More than one source has revealed that one TT Zafar was one of the ringleaders of the yaba traffickers’ cartel at Teknaf.
They said that around 10 men from his syndicate collect the yaba money from various places. They include Abu Taher, Abdul Alim, Lenga Kamal, Saiful and Khurshid.
In addition to that the names of Osman, Ishaq, Yeasin, Tikka Kader and Osman; a group of Hundi businessmen came up during the confession.
They said that a baker, a clothing shop in Teknaf’s Lamabazaar also came up during the confession.
“The anti-yaba drives will be made more stringent than ever,” said Cox’s Bazar Superintendent of Police ABM Masud.
He said that it’s everyone’s moral responsibility to make the country narcotics free and those involved in the trade won’t be spared.
Former Awami League lawmaker Abdur Rahman Bodi and several of his family members made it to the home ministry’s list of drug traders.
Bodi, his brother Mujibur Rahman, Hazi Saiful Karim, Baharchara Upazila Chairman Moulovi Aziz Uddin, Upazila Vice Chairman Rafiq Uddin, Nurul Hoque Bhutto and Siddiq Ahmed are all on the list.
Locals think that if they are not brought to justice, the yaba trafficking scene will become bigger than ever.
Last year the home ministry listed 1,151 people from Cox’s Bazar and Teknaf among which 73 people are godfathers.
Several Awami League, BNP, Jamaat-e-Islami leaders have made it to the list.