April 4, 2013Produced by Hazel Friedman She was a devoted mother popular member of the Hermanus community, in the Southern Cape, and a renowned chef specialising in African cuisine. When Liz Warren (53) was arrested in 2008 in Dakar, Senegal, for drug trafficking her friends and family were horrified. After awaiting trial for three years, on December 23, 2012,Warren was sentenced to 10 years in a Dakar prison. She will be 60-years-old when she is released. How did a mature and successful woman become embroiled in the sordid world of drug trafficking syndicates and drug mules? Alarmingly, Liz is one of a growing number of South Africans, particularly women, who are lured overseas with promises of a job, only to be coerced into smuggling small amounts of drugs, or set up as decoys, while professional drug mules carrying much larger quantities slip through customs undetected. In the brutal animal-speak of global drug trafficking, women like Liz fulfill one of two roles: they are either mules – beasts of burden – or bait – decoys whose sole purpose is to be arrested. And the horrifying narco-argot for latter is “dead cows for piranhas”. They are the dead meat thrown to the smaller predators, while the bigger fish continue to transport their illicit cargo without fear of arrest. In Liz’s case, she was offered the opportunity to run the kitchen of a hotel in Senegal. She accepted the offer only to discover that she had been set up. Was Warren a perpetrator of drug trafficking, or a victim of human trafficking? We also follow-up on Thando Pendu – a naïve young woman from Thabong township, near Welkom, who was lured to Thailand in 2008 with the offer of a job “driving ambulances”. On her arrival she discovered the job description had changed. Because she could or would not swallow the drugs, the syndicate strapped 2kg of heroin to her chest like a suicide bomber and bought her a ticket to China. She never made it out of Bangkok and is now serving a 25-year sentence for drug smuggling. Special Assignment succeeded in tracing the syndicate member who tricked Thando and Nozukile Pendu, Thando’s mother, laid a charge against her. Yet three years later, the alleged syndicate recruiter, who still resides in Thabong, has yet to be arrested or even brought in to the police for questioning. This situation appears more the norm than the exception; for every South African languishing abroad for drug trafficking – whether as mule or decoy – there is a recruiter and drug lord walking free in South Africa. For as long as the South African authorities refuse to recognize the link between human trafficking and drug trafficking, our citizens – particularly impressionable women – will continue to be targeted by ruthless syndicates who treat them either as beast, bait or both. And ultimately, every South African should take heed: there is no such thing as a free ride. The promise of a dream job or the trip of a lifetime can become a nightmare and a life sentence, languishing in a foreign prison under horrific conditions – a dead cow thrown to piranhas.
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