Cut off Shabaab funds from sugar smuggling

The saga of the sugar cartels wreaking havoc in the industry is nothing new.

Sugar millers in western Kenya have been struggling to stay afloat for years, and chief among the factors that have brought them to near collapse is the flooding of the local market with smuggled sugar.

True, mismanagement and looting by management and directors have also played their part. Today, the biggest miller in the country, Mumias Sugar Company, is grasping at straws, with frantic efforts to ensure it remains in operation.

Many will, therefore, be shocked to hear that Al-Shabaab has been raking in millions from illicit sugar, as millers teeter on the brink of collapse, threatening to wipe out a source of livelihood for farmers and jobs for thousands of Kenyans. And the racket continues after the Somali militants masterminded the slaughter of nearly 150 Kenyan students.

BLOODY ENTREPRISE

Some three weeks after the Garissa University College massacre, it is business as usual between Kenyan sugar mandarins and their Al-Shabaab allies. It is a bloody enterprise.

According to reports by the United Nations and a United States government agency, the sugar smuggling ring is run by about 70 businessmen operating in Garissa and Nairobi and in the Somali Port city of Kismayu, from where the contraband finds its way into Kenya.

These men are also engaged in the infamous charcoal trade.

But interestingly, none of the sugar barons was named in the list of 86 companies, individuals and organisations, whose bank accounts were recently frozen on allegations of supporting terrorism. And their illicit business continues to funnel millions into Al-Shabaab’s killing machine.

The war against Al-Shabaab will never be won unless the flow of colossal sums of money from sugar and charcoal smuggling is cut off and their allies brought to book.