An enforcement officer and the suspect with the boxes of carrots.
KOTA KINABALU: A 24-year-old local man has been detained by the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) in Tawau waters on Tuesday morning (Jan 7) for failing to present valid documentation for 1,190kg of carrots found on his boat.
Tawau Maritime Zone director, Maritime Captain Shahrizan Raman, said the man was steering a fast-moving cargo boat when it was intercepted by a patrol boat at 0.8 nautical miles north of Sungai Melayu, heading towards the Malaysia-Indonesia maritime border.
“The team was conducting routine patrols under Ops Pluto Timur and Ops Tiris when they intercepted the boat at 11.10am, shortly after it departed from Batu 3 waters. Upon inspection, they discovered 170 boxes of carrots valued at RM36,000,” he said.
Further checks revealed the skipper had failed to present the necessary customs declaration papers and did not have a registered crew list in the boat’s licence.
The skipper, boat, and cargo were detained and brought to the Tawau Maritime Zone Jetty for further investigation under the Customs Act 1967 and the Sabah Ports and Harbours Department Enactment 2002.
All seized items, including the boat, engine, and cargo, were valued at over RM46,000.
Shahrizan said they could not rule out that this was an attempt to smuggle goods into a neighbouring.
“Investigations will also focus on identifying the modus operandi used by grocery suppliers to evade detection,” he added.
He said enforcement efforts would be intensified to prevent illegal activities in the Tawau waters.
“We take cross-border crime seriously. Our patrol assets are always on standby for rapid deployment,” he said.
Members of the public with information on crimes at sea can contact the Tawau Maritime Zone Operations Centre at 089-750116 or the emergency line 999.
