Now, I’m not saying that this story is in anyway related to Mark Keohane’s resignation, but these things happen. Reuters reports that Diego Perez Henao, the leader of the “Los Rastrojos” gang in Columbia, was arrested on Sunday morning near the Venezuelan-Colombian border.

Henao’s gang, which translates to “The Leftovers,” is a violent criminal gang that controls several smuggling routes and is said to be responsible for moving tonnes of cocaine into the United States every year. Henao took control of the gang after the gang kingpin, Javier Antonio Calle, turned himself in to the DEA. Henao had a bounty of $5million on his head.

The arrest is seen as a great triumph in stopping the supply of cocaine into the US, most of which is of a Columbian origin. As can be seen on the map above, most of SA’s coke stems from Bolivia, which is smuggled through Brazil before landing in Durban.

The saga of the Knysna smugglers also came to an end this weekend, with three acquittals and three convictions in what is considered to be SA’s biggest drug bust. 1 716kg of cocaine was smuggled into SA through Knysna harbour, with an estimated street value of R2 billion. You do the math.

[Source: EWN, Wikipedia, IOL]