COTABATO CITY — Policemen and agents of the Bureau of Customs (BoC) together foiled an attempt by smugglers to deliver to Zamboanga City P16 million worth of cigarettes from Indonesia.
Radio reports here on Sunday quoted Brig. Gen. Bowenn Joey M. Masauding, director of the Police Regional Office-9, as saying that personnel of units under him and BoC employees seized the contraband on Thursday, piled inside a van-type truck that has just moved out then from a roll on, roll off type vessel from Sulu that docked at the Zamboanga City Port.
The law-enforcement team involved in the operation found inside the truck 281 large boxes, containing cigarettes with Indonesian brands, amounting to P16 million, covered with other cargoes as concealment.
Mr. Masauding said the operation that led to the interception of the smuggled cigarettes was premised on tips by confidential informants. Among them were businessmen, supporting the government’s campaign against the entry into mainland Mindanao of cigarettes from Indonesia via the territorial seas of the southern Sulu and Tawi-Tawi island provinces. — John Felix M. Unson
