Multiple Gabonese security and intelligence services carried out a special operation in Woleu-Ntem province against drug-trafficking and clandestine-immigration networks.[1] The operation involved agents of the Directorate General of Research, the B2, the immigration directorate, the Central Anti-Drug Office and the Directorate General of Special Services.[1] In the Far-west quarter of Bitam, investigators detained several suspected participants including a woman close to 70 who acknowledged selling cannabis for 17 years and a 22-year-old secondary-school student.[1]
In Bitam, notably in the Méyo-Kyé district, investigators found cannabis cultivated, packaged and stored near dwellings inside plantations before sale.[1] Officers discovered two large bales holding more than 453 cannabis bundles, while the suspected female owner fled after indirectly acknowledging the facts through her son.[1] Overall, the services seized nearly 500 cannabis bundles and detained several people suspected of supplying the cross-border distribution network.[1]
Prosecutor Léance Mba Mihindou of the specialized national prosecution office said the seizure was valued at about 16 million CFA francs on the Oyem side and declared a zero-tolerance policy on narcotics.[1] Investigators also suspected a couple of a Gabonese woman and a Cameroonian man of drug dealing and illicit ammunition sales through a circuit linking Méyo-Kyé, Kiossi in Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea.[1] The services said networks had shifted part of their activity inland as the Greater Libreville market dried up, and praised cooperation from local residents as essential to dismantling the clandestine circuits.[1]
