Two Chinese nationals have been arrested by police officers at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) attempting to illegally export 5.5 tonnes of fish to China.
According to Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) Customs officers at JKIA, the two were nabbed after the foreigners failed to present proper documentation for the exportation of the goods.
The consignment of live deep crabs worth Sh11.4 million were being stored at a storage facility in Utawala before they were ferried to JKIA to be shipped.
Upon questioning, a clearing agent from Drenal Enterprises Limited informed the officers that the consignment originated from Kilifi County and was booked for export to China by Weida Investment Ltd.
The clearing agent presented permit documents from the Kenya Fisheries Services (KFS) that were declared non-authentic by KFS.
Through a statement, the police say that the crabs are a restricted commodity for export out of the country.
The consignment is currently being held in custody as KRA awaits further instructions from KFS.
In recent times, the security at JKIA has been beefed up following an increase in the incidents of smuggling of natural resources such as gold and ivory. Travellers have also been intercepted with large sums of money which they have failed to account for.
Deputy President William Ruto’s ally was last week nabbed with Sh238 million in foreign currency at the JKIA.
Paul Kemboi, who is said to be a politician eyeing the Chesumei constituency seat in Nandi County was arrested by KRA Customs officers based at the airport after he landed in the country from Bujumbura, Burundi.
According to the police, Kemboi had a hard time explaining what he does for a living to make the huge sum of cash he was arrested with.
At some point when pressured, he waffled around saying he is a large-scale maize trader based in Burundi and later changed tune, claiming that he had won a lottery what forced the customs officials to confiscate the cash before handing him over to the Anti-Terror Police Unit.
KRA officials said the money was packed as a parcel and the suspect had made a wrongful declaration on the intended destination, before it was flagged as a possible money laundering transaction.
Documents in his possession indicated the parcel had been sent from Banque de Credit de Bujumbura (BCB) to a recipient identified as Brinks Global Services, Kenya.
After clearance by the Customs Unit at the airport, Kemboi presented the money at the Swissport cargo shed with different export documents for shipment to Global Services, UK.
“The documents produced to support the export request were different from those produced on entry into the country,” KRA said.
It is now believed that part of the cash was meant to fund political party related activities around the country.