Police
at Tunduma bourder post have impounded more than 5,000 logs suspected
to be smuggled from the neigbouring Zambia, though the consignment bore
no official document showing the place of original.
The seizure follows the ongoing investigations to establish origin of 31 illegal log containers worth Sh310m destined for China impounded last month at the Dar es Salaam Port.
The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, Dr Adelhelm Meru has accused local companies based in Tunduma District bordering Zambia of associating with illegal exportation of the forestry resources.
In an exclusive interview yesterday in Dar es Salaam Tanzania Forest Services (TFS) Director of Planning and Resource utilization Mohamed Kilongo confirmed that all log consignments passing through Tunduma border post were short of legal documents to establish their origin.
“But the government decided to carry out an investigation from July to establish the origin of 31 log containers impounded at the Dar port last month,” he said.
However, he said almost all drivers transporting log consignments interrogated during the investigation confessed to have obtained the logs from Zambia, implying that “all logs have been illegally harvested from Zambia and illegally channeled through Tunduma bourder post."
“But we need to have a fatal sanitary certificate to prove if those logs were indeed obtained from Zambia in a situation where Zambia officials deny that they have been smuggled from their country ," he said, though it has been established that the consignments were smuggled during night.
Furthermore the government decided to enquire more detail from Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) office at Tunduma border post to establish the motive behind the increase of illegal harvesting.
Though the TRA report revealed that 424 illegally harvested logs containers passed through Tunduma border from January to November this year, the officials had no legal documents for consignments passing through the border, posing a question over how TRA officials allowed the passage.
The seizure follows the ongoing investigations to establish origin of 31 illegal log containers worth Sh310m destined for China impounded last month at the Dar es Salaam Port.
The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, Dr Adelhelm Meru has accused local companies based in Tunduma District bordering Zambia of associating with illegal exportation of the forestry resources.
In an exclusive interview yesterday in Dar es Salaam Tanzania Forest Services (TFS) Director of Planning and Resource utilization Mohamed Kilongo confirmed that all log consignments passing through Tunduma border post were short of legal documents to establish their origin.
“But the government decided to carry out an investigation from July to establish the origin of 31 log containers impounded at the Dar port last month,” he said.
However, he said almost all drivers transporting log consignments interrogated during the investigation confessed to have obtained the logs from Zambia, implying that “all logs have been illegally harvested from Zambia and illegally channeled through Tunduma bourder post."
“But we need to have a fatal sanitary certificate to prove if those logs were indeed obtained from Zambia in a situation where Zambia officials deny that they have been smuggled from their country ," he said, though it has been established that the consignments were smuggled during night.
Furthermore the government decided to enquire more detail from Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) office at Tunduma border post to establish the motive behind the increase of illegal harvesting.
Though the TRA report revealed that 424 illegally harvested logs containers passed through Tunduma border from January to November this year, the officials had no legal documents for consignments passing through the border, posing a question over how TRA officials allowed the passage.
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