Police Probe Portuguese Businessman over Sh620 Million Gold Seized at JKIA

Authorities have beefed up security at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) after a foreign national attempted to smuggle 100kgs of gold to Budapest, Hungary through the airport. 

People Daily reports that detectives are investigating how Portuguese citizen Joao Carlos Ramalho Ferreira managed to ferry the gold consignment to Nairobi from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The gold worth Sh621.5 million was allegedly moved to neighboring Uganda after attempts to ship it to Budapest failed.

Ferreira, an economist based in Hungary, is said to be a shrewd businessman with links to some prominent political leaders in Africa.

It is reported that the 67-year-old previously worked as a football agent in Portugal before he shifted his base to Budapest where he is allegedly involved in gold smuggling.

A senior officer attached to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) told the daily that Ferreira registered a company in Kenya with the help of a Nairobi-based attorney.

“Our investigations have revealed a lot. The foreigner opened a company purporting to be dealing in, among other things, gold business. We are however on high alert to ensure that smugglers do not use Kenya as a transit point,” he said.

Sources said the gold consignment was smuggled from the DRC’s mineral-rich Katanga area in October last year through Burundi with the help of powerful Congolese military general John Numbi, a close associate of Ferreira.

Numbi has been on the run for months after he was charged with the murder of human rights activist Floribert Chebeya Bahizire and his driver Fidèle Bazana Edadi in April last year.

Bahizire and his driver disappeared on June 1st, 2010, after Numbi summoned them at the police headquarters in Kinshasa.