Siassi District is divided by sea; half of the district is on the mainland, Morobe, and the other half is an island.
For the past 12 months, serious offences such as rape and murder on the island have increased and much of it has been blamed on drug abuse.
A move planned by Joel Johnson, the district’s local level government council president, aims to break the marijuana trade links on the island and arrest the drug lords.
"There will be a major police operation on the island that will last for a month or two, to curb the marijuana problem,” Johnson said.
The island is also being used as a transit location for traffickers smuggling large quantities of marijuana into the New Guinea Islands region.
Random security checks at the Lae wharf and Nadzab Airport have forced traffickers to use the sea route from Lae to Siassi, then into the New Guinean Islands.
The large quantities of marijuana that made it past security checks are then packed into smaller parcels and sold for K5 on the streets in Rabaul and Bougainville if the traffickers are not busted.
Much of it comes from the Highlands regions, from places like Kainantu. Some are cultivated on the island.
Siassi District only gives a tiny picture of the bigger problem happening in other places in the country were law and’Order is rendered ineffective.
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