By Juma Magino
BUSIA
Customs officials at the Busia border town have arrested three people for allegedly smuggling counterfeit notes into Uganda.
The trio was arrested on Friday, 17th March, 2023 after suspicious customs officials mounted a check on a Modern Coast Bus destined for Uganda.
The Uganda Revenue Authority seized the counterfeit money in 5,000 and 10,000-shilling denomination notes, amounting to 40.8 Million Shillings as they were being loaded onto a Modern Coast Bus Registration number KDA 155X.
A statement from Uganda Revenue Authority, URA states that the Ugandan currency notes had been stacked in a suspicious package that had been declared but later manually crossed out.
This triggered suspicion from officers who immediately opened the package to find 10,000 and 5000 new notes carefully stashed.
According to the statement, the load was thought to be a case of failure to declare but upon verification, it turned out to be counterfeit money amounting to 40,845,000 shillings.
Three suspects have since been arrested and the bus impounded.
By Saturday morning, the bus was still parked at URA Compound in Busia.
