The two health officials work at the Khothalang Clinic and the other is a committee member of this clinic. The tablets were allegedly stolen from the clinic and handed to local contacts who were going to transport and sell it in Kimberley in the Northern Cape.

The confiscated tablets included 170 bottles of Tribuss and 213 bottles of Atroizea tablets. All three suspects are expected to appear in the Virginia Magistrate’s Court today. The Free State Department of Health spokesperson, Mondli Mvambi, says the tablets are alleged to be available on the black market for zama zamas (Illegal foreign miners) who mix it with heroin.

“We hear there are zama zamas who use these. There are people who buy them from private doctors because they can’t show their faces at clinics. They are also alleged to be used for the Nyaope concoction of drugs”, he said.

This is the fifth arrest by the Free State Police involving stolen ARV tablets since the beginning of 2020. OFM News reported two weeks ago that three suspects were arrested in possession of 48 containers of ARV tablets in Welkom.

Three weeks before that, three men and a woman were also arrested in possession of 160 bottles of ARV tablets in Thabong. A week before that, two men and a woman were also arrested in Ventersburg with 265 bottles of ARVs. One day before, two men including an Eastern Cape health worker, were arrested in possession of 1068 bottles of ARVs in Bloemfontein.

All the suspects appeared in court and investigations into their cases are still ongoing. Mvambi says the Free State MEC for Health, Montseng Tsiu, expressed shock upon hearing the news of yet another ARV bust.

“It is unacceptable that the people who are entrusted to provide care, become the ones that scheme and plot to steal and defraud the sick and vulnerable people of the lifesaving drugs. I trust that the law enforcement agencies will secure all the necessary evidence and present a solid case for a long-term incarceration of the offenders,” Tsiu says.

OFM News