META

 

What appeared to immigration officials in Johannesburg to be a group of Mexican tourists visiting South Africa’s famous wildlife reserves may have been something very different, according to police investigators.

Authorities believe the visitors were chemists working for Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel who travelled to South Africa to establish an industrial-scale crystal methamphetamine laboratory on a game farm near Swartruggens. Investigators say the facility is among at least seven large meth labs uncovered across southern Africa over the past two years.

South African authorities suspect the laboratory formed part of a wider network allegedly established to supply lucrative drug markets in Australia and New Zealand. Methamphetamine commands significantly higher prices in those countries than in the United States, making them attractive destinations for international trafficking operations.

When police raided the Swartruggens facility in May, investigators estimated that it could produce as much as five tonnes of methamphetamine every month. At Australian wholesale prices, that quantity could be worth about $1 billion, with its value potentially much higher once sold at street level.

Brigadier Devon Naicker, who heads the South African Narcotics Enforcement Bureau (SANEB), told AFP that investigators were examining whether a methamphetamine shipment seized in Australia had originated from the Swartruggens operation.

The shipment had travelled through Durban, and investigators were examining its packaging and other characteristics as part of the probe. Naicker said he could not disclose the investigative methods being used to establish the suspected link because the case remains active.

According to Naicker, South Africa offers organised crime groups several advantages, including large rural areas where laboratories can be concealed, extensive international transport links and opportunities for corruption.

The country also has significant commercial ties with China and India, where many of the tightly controlled chemicals required for methamphetamine production are sourced.

Australian authorities have separately confirmed that Mexican criminal organisations have increasingly targeted the country’s illicit drug market.

A January seizure demonstrated that methamphetamine is also reaching Australia by air. A 32-year-old woman was arrested at Sydney airport after arriving from South Africa with 39kg of powdered methamphetamine in her luggage.

Australia has a substantial methamphetamine market. A 2024 report compiled with the US Drug Enforcement Administration identified methamphetamine as the country’s most widely consumed illicit drug after cannabis.

Australian and New Zealand authorities have previously linked local branches of the Comancheros motorcycle gang to drug supplies obtained from the Sinaloa cartel.

Growing Mexican presence in South Africa

South African investigators are increasingly uncovering what they believe is a sophisticated supply chain stretching across the region.

Since 2024, 16 Mexican nationals have been arrested during police operations targeting methamphetamine laboratories in South Africa. In Nigeria, by comparison, four Mexicans have been arrested in laboratory raids this year.

The first South African laboratory displaying what investigators described as cartel characteristics was discovered in Marble Hall, northeast of Johannesburg, in 2020.

The Swartruggens operation, however, was considerably larger. Police arrested 13 people during the May raid, including five Mexicans whom investigators identified as chemists.

Police believe the Mexican nationals entered South Africa on three-month tourist visas in March 2025 and began producing crystal meth soon afterwards.

Those arrested also included two Mozambicans, a Zimbabwean and four South Africans. Three of the South Africans were members of the Afrikaner family that owned the game reserve.

A source close to the investigation told AFP that criminal organisations appeared to approach financially struggling farmers in some cases, although this was not always the pattern.

The family had purchased the farm in 2024. The parents had previously faced court proceedings after allegedly renting out land where mandrax, also known as methaqualone, was illegally manufactured for the domestic market.

Police say methamphetamine laboratories are commonly located on isolated farms that nevertheless provide convenient access to major transport routes. The Swartruggens property was situated near the N4 national highway.

Naicker said the laboratories require regular deliveries of chemicals and a reliable way of moving the finished product away from the site. Investigators therefore believe numerous consignments were transported to the farms by truck.

Signs of an industrial operation

Investigators say the Sinaloa cartel has introduced a production method known as P2P, which uses phenyl-2-propanone. One investigator said this particular method had not previously been known in South Africa.

Chemicals required for the process are believed to be imported from China and India.

Naicker said the manufacturing process can also provide an obvious warning sign because the production of certain precursors creates strong chemical odours that can travel considerable distances.

In August, police seized about five tonnes of solvents, catalysts and other chemicals used by drug manufacturers during a raid on a laboratory in Musina, near the Zimbabwean border. The operation was conducted with assistance from the US Drug Enforcement Administration and the US Department of Homeland Security.

Investigators had previously followed a suspicious container that entered South Africa through Durban in April 2023. The trail led them to five storage facilities in Midrand containing large quantities of chemicals and laboratory equipment.

Earlier this month, Naicker also announced the discovery of another industrial-scale laboratory at a farm in Klipvoor, about 175km north of Johannesburg. He described the facility as resembling a Mexican-style operation.

Among the equipment discovered were large reaction vessels capable of holding several hundred litres. Investigators believe these tanks are another indication of industrial-scale production.

A source close to the investigation said the equipment was industrial in nature but appeared to have been manufactured specifically for the operations rather than purchased from ordinary commercial suppliers.

Investigators believe specialised metalworkers may have been brought in to construct the large reaction vessels.

Naicker said senior Mexican operatives sometimes travel to South Africa to establish laboratories before leaving trained chemists behind to oversee production. In other cases, he said, Mexican specialists establish the facility, train local workers and later return periodically to monitor the operation.

South African investigators encountered a similar arrangement when they dismantled a laboratory in Krugersdorp in February 2024, where local workers allegedly continued manufacturing after receiving instruction.

A security source told AFP that Mexican nationals arrested during these operations were likely to occupy lower levels of the alleged cartel structure, despite possessing specialised technical knowledge.

The five Mexicans arrested at Swartruggens reportedly claimed that they had been blindfolded and taken hostage when they arrived in South Africa.

Investigators rejected those claims, saying the men appeared to have been provided with comfortable living conditions, including expensive food and alcohol. Authorities therefore questioned whether their account of being held against their will was credible.

Similar developments in Nigeria

Authorities in Nigeria are reporting a comparable pattern.

Methamphetamine laboratories suspected of links to the Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation cartels have reportedly re-emerged in the country after Mexican criminal organisations were thought to have been driven out about a decade ago.

Nigeria, like South Africa, has large rural areas where laboratories can be concealed, as well as ports and airports that can be exploited for international trafficking.

The largest meth laboratory ever discovered in Nigeria was raided in May in Ogun State. Three Mexican nationals suspected of cartel connections and seven Nigerians were arrested.

Another Mexican national was detained during a June operation in Oyo State.

Femi Babafemi of Nigeria’s National Drug Law Enforcement Agency said the scale of the two laboratories indicated that they were designed to supply international markets, particularly in Europe, Southeast Asia and Oceania.

The Ogun State laboratory was located inside a forest. Residents of nearby communities initially believed the foreigners were developing a housing estate.

Florence Banjo, a 59-year-old resident, said villagers had been pleased by reports that a housing development would bring improvements, including paving a road leading to their community.

According to the NDLEA, five of the 28 methamphetamine laboratories dismantled in Nigeria since 2016 have involved Mexican nationals.

Babafemi said Mexican operatives had first appeared in Nigeria about a decade ago to provide technical expertise to local criminal partners. After the Mexicans left, he said, local collaborators continued operating the laboratories.

He attributed the renewed cartel presence partly to increased pressure from authorities in the United States and Latin America.

Vanda Felbab-Brown, director of the Brookings Institution’s Initiative on Nonstate Armed Groups, warned that the expansion of Mexican cartels beyond Latin America warranted serious attention.

She said Africa provided favourable conditions for cartel operations, including opportunities for corruption, and added that the methamphetamine being produced through these newer networks was reportedly more potent and dangerous than drugs historically supplied to Australia by criminal groups from China and Myanmar.

Regional impact extends beyond trafficking

Mozambique has also increasingly featured in investigations into the regional drug trade.

Once viewed largely as a transit point, the country saw two Mexican nationals arrested at Maputo airport in April. Authorities later discovered a significant quantity of chemicals used in methamphetamine production at the home of an alleged local associate.

Officials are concerned that large-scale drug production and trafficking in Africa could also increase local consumption.

Antonio De Vivo, head of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime's Maputo office, said intermediaries involved in trafficking are sometimes compensated partly with drugs rather than money. Those individuals then need to sell the drugs within local markets.

Paulo Ferrao, a 27-year-old former drug user who now works at a detoxification centre near Maputo, said his facility was seeing an increase in methamphetamine-related cases.

He said the growing number of methamphetamine cases suggested that heroin was no longer the only major drug being driven through trafficking networks in the area.

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