Police in Chinhoyi have arrested four suspected drug dealers and recovered mbanje satchets.
Seventy-four bottles of Chibuku Super beer and 26 Castle Larger quarts were also recovered from the house where the drugs and alcohol were allegedly being sold illegally.
Charles Mafuriranwa (27), Muchaneta Machemera (49), Mashiri Chrismore (28) and Prince Karima (22) were arrested when police raided their house in Ruvimbo suburb.
Their arrest followed a tip-off by informants.
National police spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi confirmed the arrests.
Police were informed that four suspects were unlawfully dealing in drugs at a house in Ruvimbo 1 and officers from the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) Drugs and Narcotics obtained a search warrant, reacted to the tip-off and raided the house.
“Two and half full sealed plastic bags of dagga, 74 sachets of dagga, 74×1,2 litres of super Chibuku and 26 castle quarts were recovered,” said Asst Comm Nyathi.
The weight of the mbanje and its street value were yet to be ascertained.
Recently, police in Manicaland separately intercepted two trucks ferrying 6,7 tonnes of mbanje, believed to have been smuggled from neighbouring countries.
A haulage truck carrying 4,7 tonnes of mbanje was intercepted along the Nyanga-Nyamapanda Road, while another with over 2 tonnes was stopped by alert Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) officers after leaving Forbes Border Post near Mutare last Wednesday.
The truck ferrying 2 tonnes of mbanje was on its way from Malawi and headed for Zimbabwe.
Its driver who disappeared when Zimra officers started searching the vehicle had declared it empty.
The mbanje was hidden in a false compartment specifically created for that purpose.
The Nyanga-Nyamapanda Road incident occurred last Wednesday around midnight when police manning a roadblock at the 75-km peg along the Nyanga-Nyamapanda Road discovered 53x90kg bags of mbanje loaded in a containerised truck around midnight.
Four people were arrested for allegedly possessing the 4,7 tonnes of the illegal drug.