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COVER STORY: CRIME
THE LONG HAUL
The cocaine trail starts from the interiors of Colombia
and winds its way to India via Africa
I see no future
in this business, pure greed thrust me into it," says Jojo a.k.a.
Jonathan Williams, 38, from Lilongwe in Swaziland. Between him and his
Nigerian friend, Chinadu Nnanabaku a.k.a. John Brown, 37, who was "financially
distressed" back in Lagos, the police have recovered over 100 gm
of pure cocaine during Op Coke. Had the two Africans been able to successfully
sell the "white gold" they would have earned upward of Rs 3
lakh in Delhi, a city where an average addict uses 3-4 gm a week, and
there are about 125-150 regular users, if not more.
The African suppliers to middlemen like Ali
are mostly from Nigeria, Tanzania and Liberia. These men would charge
Jojo or John no more than $150 (Rs 6,750) for every 10 gm; by the time
it gets passed on to Ali and others the same quantity is traded for about
Rs 20,000. Ali in turn would then make a neat profit of Rs 10,000 for
every 10 gm transaction. "So high are the margins in cocaine, that
I thought this was the way out of my penury," says the 6 ft 4 in-tall
Chinadu whose family runs a provision store in Lagos.
The trading on Delhi's streets is just one side
to the story. The real one starts rolling out of the interiors of Colombia,
from where hundreds of kilograms are secretly couriered across the world
every year. The clientele, like anywhere else, is the glitterati with
plenty of time to spare and an avid interest in the night life.
Over the years, the Nigerians have begun to
dominate the cocaine trade in India. Several recent arrests indicate this.
In one by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in July, a Nigerian national
was arrested with 396 gm of cocaine. Says Abrar Ahmed, NCB's Delhi head,
"There is little doubt that Nigerian nationals are now the biggest
traffickers of cocaine into India." The methods are dangerous: the
couriers swallow the stuff and fly across continents, unmindful that a
little leakage would kill them. But when there's a killing to be made
for the couriers there's nothing like flirting with a little danger.
STREET PRICE
Delhi: Rs 3,000-4,500 per gram
Mumbai: Rs 2,500-3,000 per gram
Prices
Colombia: $5,000 (Rs 2.4 lakh) per kg.
Brazil and Peru: $6,000 per kg.
Europe: $12,000-15,000 per kg.
North America: $9,000-10,000 per kg.
Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Swaziland,
Australia and Liberia: $20,000 per kg.
Pakistan and India: $35,000 per kg.
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